Dark Hunter Episode X
by JP Fanfic
Summary: Episode X. A new darkness rises in the galaxy years after the Second Galactic War. One woman, a bounty hunter, gets swept into the fray without knowing it.
1. Episode X Opening Crawl

**This is a sequel to my other fanfictions Dark Jedi (Episode VIII and IX) and Dark Bounty (a Boba Fett spin off). It is not required that you read those fictions as any relevant details are included in the narrative of this story, but if you would like more details on the history you are welcome to read those stories.**

**One point that is not immediately apparent, these stories are AU since the release of The Last Jedi. Up to the Fall of 2018, all of my fictions are as close to 100% compatible with Disney-sanctioned media, including The Force Awakens, Rogue One, all animated series, and all printed media. I know that is a strong claim, but I believe it is true.**

**I hope you enjoy.**

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A long time ago in a galaxy far far away . . . .

STAR

WARS

Episode X

DARK HUNTER

The galaxy is on the edge of disorder. With unrest in the Senate concerning galactic and local system sovereignty, the young government struggles to find a way to avoid the dissolving of the Galactic government. Outer rim systems are threatening to secede in spite of threats from the loyal core systems.

Amidst the uncertainty, the prodige of Boba Fett, a young bounty hunter clone named VIDESSE OTLELL, endeavors to care for her dying mother in the relative quiet of Geonosis. However, a dark power grows over the galaxy, and it's shadow has begun to reach her desolate planet . . . .

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**By the opening crawl, you may notice a few things. The war of The Force Awakens has been over for years, Boba Fett survived the Sarlacc Pit in The Return of the Jedi, and there is a new line of clones. These elements are fleshed out in the narrative, but in an opening crawl there is not space to fill those details in. Rest assured it will happen when natural for the story.**

**As always, favorite, follow, and review! Thanks.**


	2. Episode X A Brief Scene From the Past

The orange glow of the planet of Geonosis lit the cold space, warming the void as much as anything was able. A global dust storm covered the planet's entirety giving it a smooth and peaceful appearance, hiding the tempest's deadly power. The planet's rings ornamented its polished form; thin and delicate. It was a once populated and thriving planet. However, now it was desolate, abandoned, and raging. The narrow line of rings gave a hint of its old grandeur, stripped by the Empire. This was where the first Death Star was constructed, a secret weapon of incredible destruction, and the Empire would not have witnesses. Therefore, at the direction of the Emperor all life was exterminated. Now it lies, forsaken except for its rings and one man.

This moment was fourteen years ago from our present story and thirty one years after the much historicized battle of Yavin. It was the very battle of Yavin where this Death Star was destroyed; the battle that has been well documented and duly politicized for decades by those that would make their lives documenting such things. My place here is not to follow in those steps, as I certainly do not aspire to such heights, nor do my strengths allow it. However, as it is necessary for me to relay a brief history of one character and her settings in order to give her due justice, I will here document and historicize a single event, for the sake of my heroine, and only for her sake.

So please direct your attention away from the titian planet that I had just described, and look into the vastness of space; and you will find it just as dead as the planet; silent. For humans, it is enough to dwell on the stillness and utter vastness of space for a few seconds and somehow find philosophy in the stars; yet to continue cogitating much longer may sometimes bring their minds to despair. However, as most narrators do, I lied to you in order to create a contrast, for just as you began to contemplate that this outer space is devoid of life for light years in any direction and as you reach the moment that considering its emptiness would have plunged you into the madness of hearing whispers that you may _try_ to convince yourself do not exist; just at that moment, a white flash erupted in the blackness of space. A two-man craft materialized from lightspeed, abruptly decelerating to a halt. It was a small ship, a YAR-41, made by the Outer Rim Manufacturing company, and like all of their starships, it was small, light, and well armed. The YAR-41 was ugly with one stabilizer to the port side fitted with a sublight engine on its distal extremity, and another engine on the fuselage, a triangular fuselage. It was an unattractive ship, meant for unattractive work; the work of unattractive beings.

The ship remained stationary for a moment as if to catch its breath from lightspeed, then began to drift weightlessly to the surface. The tired ship lingered as it tested the turbulent atmosphere of the presently angry planet. The winds began, at first, to gently rock the ship, as the high altitude atmosphere was so thin it only made a playful attempt at an attack. However, the ship continued to descend and the planet increased its effort to repel it. The YAR-41 lurched to starboard as a gust caught the stabilizer like a sail, trying to send it into a spin, but the pilot, not being a human, corrected the trajectory without hesitation. One benefit of being a protocol droid is not having a stomach to lose. The passenger of the spacecraft was not so lucky. She screamed out and gripped her chair as the ship was thrown and tossed in the sandy gusts. She was a child, five years old and an orphan.

"Videsse, please do not blame me for the disagreeable piloting," the droid replied. "I have not been fitted with this type of programing. It would have been better foresight of your mother to have . . ." The droid stopped. The child sniffed and wiped her face. "Perhaps, maybe, I ought to shut up," he finished.

Another gale threw the craft, this time downward. The winds were getting fiercer and the hull of the ship creaked with each blow. The droid pulled up and stabilized the ship again, then turned on the holographic imaging. The creamy orange atmosphere was overlaid with a topographical terrain image. Digital blue mountains and sharp valleys appeared that were hidden behind the veil of sand.

"That's better," the droid said as if proud he thought of it, "Though, your mother would have been better at flying this thing." The ship reeled upward and into a spin. The child screamed out again and clung to her restraining harness before the droid righted the ship.

"No doubt," the droid agreed.

After a few more minutes and many kilometers, the holographic image showed a small energy dome nestled in a wide valley behind the thick dust. The wind still reached it, but the shallow valley protected it from the most intense atmospheric attacks.

"The coordinates were accurate," the droid stated. "Now to see if the rest of the intel is-accurate, I mean."

He switched open the ship's transponder. "This is the ship, _Desert Clutch_, seeking to land." The droid muted the communicator. "I really hope Boba Fett is not in the mood Mistress Terrah had said he was typical for."

There was no response, and the droid tried to hover as the ship was tossed back and forth in the dusty waves of the storm.

"I repeat," the droid began, "this is the ship, _Desert Clutch_-"

The thick air lit with blood red laser blasts, the light refracting in the sand so the whole view screen flashed red. The ship jolted as one of the blasts deflected off the fuselage. Alarms blared.

"Oh dear, foolish me," the droid quipped. "Master Fett! Stop. I was sent with a mission to-"

More laser shots lit the view screen.

"Terrah Otlell sent us!" the droid reported as quickly as he could, and tried to move away from the blasts.

The barrage ceased.

Nothing else happened for a moment. The girl remained quiet and hugged her knees.

"I'm afraid I do not have any other instructions if Master Fett chooses not to let us land," the droid stated.

"Who are you and why are you here?" a gruff voice spoke over the COM.

"Uh, Master Boba Fett," the droid stammered. "I am PZ-85, a protocol droid previously owned by Terrah Otlell. I believe she was an associate of yours . . . at times. I can only assume that she had programmed me with a crypt program I was unaware of. When she had not returned for fourteen days, the hidden program activated, informing me of these coordinates, quite surprising to me, I would let you know-"

"Enough, droid," Boba ordered. "Why are you here? You have thirty seconds before I harvest you and your ship for scrap parts."

"Oh dear," PZ-85 replied. "I am here to deliver to you Terrah Otlell's clone. My programming was to deliver myself and her to you in the event her extended absence. Of course, like I said, it was a crypt program. I am surprised to think that she would-"

"Shut up, droid," Boba interrupted, again. There was communication silence for a moment before Boba continued. "The shield's coming down. Land. Nothing funny. I don't care if Terrah sent you, you'll be disintegrated if you try anything."

"Yes, Sir," PZ-85 answered and promptly lowered the ship. He turned off the transponder and looked to the child. "I do think this is going well." He reached for a pair of goggles and a scarf. "You will need these."

He placed the cloth scarf over the girl's nose and mouth and helped her position the goggles to pinch the scarf in place. "That should protect you from the storm." The goggles were too large for her face, giving her an insect like appearance. Her jet black, shoulder-length hair fell over the top of the goggles; the only feature that could be distinguishable under her protective gear.

"Are you ready," the droid asked.

The girl nodded but her tense form, her clasped hands, and high shoulders showed the opposite.

A small ramp descended from the back of the _Desert Clutch_ and the two figures stumbled down as the wind pummelled them. The girl clung to the tottering droid for support as they traversed the shifting terrain toward the place where the energy dome had been. After they had walked a dozen meters, the energy dome materialized behind them. The gusting wind abruptly ceased as the energy field formed an immediate shelter, and the sand in the air dropped like a quick downpour of rain.

The girl, who had been covering her face with her free hand, lowered it and looked cautiously around now that she could finally see.

Before them stood the man, fully clothed in Mandalorian armor, not the green Mandalorian armor he had been known for, but a dull grey and battle worn armor, scarred and dented. His carbine rifle was aimed at them.

"Take _its_ mask off," Boba ordered PZ-85. The sharp whine of his rifle charging cut through the now still air.

"Master, I hardly think a protocol droid and a girl are worthy of your extreme caution," PZ objected.

"A girl, maybe," Boba said flatly. "Could be a Jawa for all I know. Do it."

PZ-85 hobbled over to Videsse and removed the scarf and goggles, revealing her olive skin, and striking emerald eyes. She looked up at Boba, her face trying to hide her fear as she bit her lip and furrowed her eyebrows.

What did Boba see when he looked at her? Did he see her trying to hide her fear? Of course he did. How could a man so apt at hiding behind a mask help but notice? If he did notice and if it did affect him, no one could tell; not from behind that ambiguous mask. Perhaps his silence was enough to let us know the internal struggle. However, look, we may not need to guess any longer, for Boba had reached behind his helmet with his gauntleted left hand, not lowering the gun in his right hand, of course. He had grasped his helmet and lifted it off his head. Did his face show what he thought about the girl? His eyes were bloodshot and weak. Was he drunk, or tired, or was it something else? Those bloodshot eyes would be the only hint that we would receive from his face, the drawn and weather worn face would give nothing else.

"Terrah?" he said in a low voice. "She _is_ Red's clone." With that, he was silent for another stretch of time. The gun did not falter in its aim.

Could it be that he was considering taking in these two destitutes? Maybe he could hear the voice of his father counseling him from beyond the grave. What would Jango Fett say to his son?

"She is a clone just like you. She lost her parent, just like you."

Of course, Boba did not hear those words, as if the dead could actually speak with audible voices. Could such an argument even sway the solitary and opportunistic Boba Fett, the battle-seasoned, deadly, and cunning bounty hunter? Let us wait to hear his reply.

Boba did not take his eyes off the girl, piercing her as if he were looking into the dusty surface behind her.

"I don't need a protocol droid," he said abruptly. "And I definitely don't need a clone of Terrah."

He lowered the carbine rifle and holstered it on his back.

"But I have some things that need fixed, and this _Patch_ might just learn to do that." He referred to Videsse. "And you, droid. I think that I might have some ideas for your improvement, too."

"Thank you so much, Master Boba," PZ-85 began. "I had my doubts as to whether we would be leaving-"

"You won't be leaving," Boba interrupted. "That YAR-41 was the reason I decided to keep you. I want that ship."

"Oh," PZ-85 replied. "I guess I will take that reason without complaint."

"You have no choice," Boba countered. "Now, you and the _patch_ follow me." He turned back to his small permacrete hut.

It was the first time Videsse was referred to as _Patch_. It was now simply a title, but later would become her pseudonym. She did not hate it as much as she would in the near future. It was also the first of her many pseudonyms, but it was the one she would grow to hate more than any other.

Videsse walked timidly behind PZ-85 as they followed Boba Fett. "Peezee," she said. "When is mother coming back?"

"She's never coming back," Boba answered for the droid. His voice was not harsh which would have been expected from him. It was low, but it could not be described as weak. Those words were heavy, and all three of these figures had to carry them.

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**A brief note about the narrative style, since this style is not a common convention among Star Wars narratives. Every story I write, I try to emulate a particular narrative style. This one is fashioned after The House of the Seven Gables by Nathaniel Hawthorne. It is a narrative style where the narrator has a very heavy presence, often addressing the reader directly, or thinking out loud himself. You may notice that when he is telling the story it is in the past tense, but when he switches to the how the story may be affecting the reader or himself, the tense switches to present tense. This is intentional: the story he tells has already happened, but his telling of the story is currently happening, so there is the justification of tense changes. **


	3. Episode X Dark Clouds on the Horizon

The next fourteen years of Videsse's life were neither as good, nor as bad as they could have been. Such is the nature and condition of all of our lives. She followed in the footsteps of Boba's tutelage. Though Boba never admitted to liking her, she gradually grew to understand that he did love her-in his own way before he died. As for Terrah, her mother, she did return; for she was certainly _not _dead. However, it is not my intention to expound on those stories. As with the history of the Galaxy, someone else has narrated the story of Boba Fett's realization of his affection for Videsse, and of Terrah Otlell's return to her daughter. If you would care to trudge through the muck of those stories; if you cared about kidnappings and dog fights; pirate traps and blood hunters; if that kind of drivel would interest you, then go and find those stories and read them elsewhere. I am committed not to waste my time nor yours. How Boba found the infamous _Millenium Falcon_ in the aftermath of the Lybeya battle, how the eleven-year-old Videsse repaired it to working order, how she was then kidnapped by an avaricious collector of ships and men, how Boba Fett had to make a choice between Videsse and the _Falcon, _and how Videsse became wealthy in the process; that story you will have to find on your own. I will not tell it. Neither will I tell you about how Terrah faked her death to escape pursuit from that same collector, how she had obtained Boba Fett's old ship, _Slave-1_ and renamed it, how she fell into the trap of a pirate, the same trap Videsse was caught in, how they were hunted by hybrid hounds, and how Terrah returned to Videsse and to the man she loved. I absolutely will not give that story here. I have a commitment to my heroine to avoid falling into those expositional traps. Speaking of our heroine, where did she go? I seem to have lost her in the midst of the throngs of Nar Shaddaa.

Nar Shaddaa, also known as the Smuggler's Moon, was a moon of Nal Hutta in the Mid Rim of the galaxy. It was a moon covered by a sprawling city, a filthy and corrupt city, Hutta town. As the name implies, the moon had been ruled by the Hutt crime lords for centuries. Currently, Felga the Hutt filled the syndicate throne and had for almost forty years.

The moon's narrow alleyways were and always had been crowded with travelers, smugglers, traders, and criminals, like a wart-hornet hive. To find anyone in the mass was an impossible task, men, women, and beasts weaving between each other in random, but intentional directions. Sweat and stench, heat and humidity pervaded the alleyways like the sticky forests of Ryloth without the appealing flora, just metal and mud. Only out of necessity did anyone try to maneuver the muck maze. It is a good place to make you sick, and possibly get a vibroblade in the side if marked by a predator. So instead of finding the young woman here, for she was in there somewhere, let me take you to where she was going; where we may be able to breathe a little easier and wait for her arrival. She will emerge unscathed, be sure of that.

A ramshackle ship garage resided in what we could call the Mid Rim of the city; not in the center of Felga's rule, but not so far away from it that the underground anarchy bubbled up. The owner, an aging Trandoshan named Donal, worked for decades under the protection of Felga's extortion. He perpetually repaired spacecraft with his shop droid, and Timcamca, a faithful Dug, if there could be such a thing. Donal had become a long time friend of Boba Fett, also, if there could be such a thing. His lizard-like appearance, set most people on edge; especially knowing the history of his race as slave traders and villains. However, Donal was not like the majority of his race. For one, he was a coward; an impossible characteristic that he had somehow overcome at rare times.

He sat in his chair behind a small business table, with his back to the front door, staring at a dead _Chir'daki _starfighter. He scratched his forehead and squinted at the ship.

Timcamca was working on the top, replacing steam vents, and cursing out loud, aiming his comments indirectly at Donal.

"Calm down, Tim," Donal growled. "It's not a waste to change the vents. We'll get it flying again." Then, speaking to himself he said in a quiet tone, "I just need to think about how we are actually going to fix this trash heap. Especially, for the price the owner is willing to pay."

The Dug made another loud and rude reply in his own language.

"Don't worry, We'll figure it out," Donal replied. He raised his scaled eyebrows as a thought occurred to him. "That spare-parts X-wing, out back. Does it still have a motivator?"

The Dug barked back at him.  
"Well, I don't care if it is _good _or not. Just decent enough. Let's try that. Droid," Donal called his repair droid. It scurried to his feet. "Get that motivator off the T-70. We're going to try and cram it in this ship."

"D'you care if this is good or not," a female voice interjected from behind him.

He spun on his chair, eyes wide in potential danger. How could he have turned his back on the front door; not a wise thing to do in Nar Shaddaa. He reflexively put his hand under the table to finger a small blaster, but there was no need.

A black armored woman stood like a statue in front of him. One hand on her hip, and the other on a resting blaster she had placed on the table. She was wearing a black helmet with glowing blue eye screens, giving her an almost droid-like appearance. A red starburst insignia shone brightly against the black polished veneer on her right shoulder.

Donal's face brightened, a horrifying spectacle to see on a Trandoshan, such that the grimace would make a young Ewok scream. "Dess! Good to see you again." He rose and embraced her in his monstrous arms. She affectionately returned the hug, not seeming to mind his Trandoshan stench. "Or should I say Ohara, or- dang, I never know what name you are going by at any time."

"Dark Star today, but Dess is fine right now," she replied and removed her helmet. She was now nineteen and her features had blossomed into a strikingly beautiful woman. Her eyes had not lost the gleam of her youth and were large and as bright as emeralds. Her olive skin was still smooth and clear, despite the harsh Geonosian winds that tried to age her. Her hair was just over shoulder length but when _at work,_ like today, she braided it up tightly to her scalp so not a strand fell, except for the chin-length bangs. She looked exactly like her mother when she first encountered Boba Fett at the Sarlacc pit of Tatooine decades ago. Also, like her mother, she was well fitted with weaponry on her belt; two DX-2 pistols at each hip, a dozen explosive charges, two vibroblades hidden in her gauntlets, as well as dart throwers, and a small sleek jet pack.

"So, d'you need a blaster?" she questioned Donal.

He looked down at the black metal blaster, pockmarked and scarred.

"Where'd you get this?" he asked with a hiss.

"Made a deal with some scoundrel on the way here," Videsse shrugged.

"Yeah," Donal smiled. "And what did you give him for this piece of junk."

Now Videsse smiled. "Oh, about six to eight weeks for the bone to heal. I ain't too happy about getting jumped in the alley, y'know."

Donal nodded. He did not need to say more.

"So d'you get them," Videsse changed the subject.

Donal suddenly became serious and his face dropped, hiding his sharp teeth. "Yeah . . . yeah," he slurred and turned to a closed drawer behind him. "I, uh, found them in the Quatora district. And here." He placed a few credits on the counter. "They weren't as expensive as you thought. The price is always changing."

He then produced a small clear canister filled with three dozen purple capsules.

"How's she doing?" he asked softly.

"Fine," Videsse replied. "Fine. I think these are working."

However, Donal saw how she furrowed her brow and bit her lip.

"Your mother's a strong woman, Dess," he consoled, knowing that he needed to. Perhaps, he was consoling himself as well. "She is strong like you."

Videsse shook her head as if to free herself from the snare of an oppressive thought. "Whatever." She opened the canister and fingered one of the translucent purple pellets. "They are workin' just fine. Better than the meds the med droids gave." She pushed the extra credits back across the table toward Donal. "Keep those, I'm sure you'll need it workin' on _that_ thing." She referenced the _Chir'daki_. "I could fix that up better if I had the time." She made a nervous laugh and bit her lip again.

Donal reached over and touched her hand. She stopped laughing and almost withdrew her hand. If Donal had said that everything was going to be okay, she would have. However, he said, "I'm sure you could fix it. You absolutely could."

Videsse nodded and started to shift her feet.

Donal changed the subject. "You fly here in that _SS-64_?"

Videsse coughed as if to get something out of her throat. "Yeah, why?"

Donal sat back down in his chair and crossed his arms. "Hopefully nothing serious, but a few darkly clad fellows came in here asking about it a few days ago."

Videsse's face squinched in confusion. "_The Vigilance_? Why was anyone looking for that?"

"Don't know," he answered. "But they knew that some Sith Lady, Darth Irata had previous possession of it. Seemed important to them."

Videsse scratched the back of her head under one of her tight braids. She recessed into her thoughts for a moment, then shrugged her shoulders. "Well, with the _Falcon_, now I've got two prized ships."

Donal replied sternly, "I wouldn't brush it off, Dess. I didn't tell them that I knew anything about it, but it's never a good sign when men are on a hunt."

She nodded and for Donal, she took off the flippant demeanor she had adopted as her mask. "I know. Don't worry. I'm not ignoring it. Just . . ." She took a deep breath and put her helmet back on. "Just let me deal with one thing at a time." She put the clear canister in a side pouch. "Thanks, Donal. You're a lifesaver." With that she slipped out the front door, silent and dark, like a shadow.

"I hope so," Donal whispered to himself. "I hope so."

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**As I said earlier, all the background information you need is given in the text. And any new details from the past you need will also be included in future narratives.**

**But if you want to know more about these details, How Boba Fett obtained the _Millenium Falcon_ during the Lybeya Battle, you can find it in Dark Jedi Episode VIII and XI. **

**How Boba Fett survived the Sarlacc Pit, how he raised Videsse, and Videsse's mother's story are detailed in Dark Bounty.**

**Thanks for reading. Comment, Follow, Favorite, if you want. If not, no worries.**


	4. Episode X One Conversation

Now, we return to Geonosis. Our story again draws us to this lonely planet. How often must we return to desolation? How often do our own stories bring us back to somewhere like this very place, where death and loneliness hang over us like a shadow?

The orange planet was not raging with a global storm as it was the last time we observed it, the cracked and scarred geography now clearly visible. Though there was wind, only small clouds of dust were disturbed by it. The broad protected valley that Videsse's shelter resided in seemed to be completely still as if holding its breath. Fifty hectares of quinto grain were just ready to be harvested, the dead brown stalks tottering, waiting to fall under the blade of a reaper. Two dozen moisture vaporators were sitting amongst the grain like gravestones; gravestones that paradoxically provided living water to the dying grain.

Videsse's ship, the _Vigilance_, settled onto a level patch of bare ground, beside a small permacrete hut. The engines on its dorsal wing stabilizers roared in the valley as the ship lowered and came to rest, kicking up a cloud of dust that almost hid the ship. Once settled, the engines hummed to a dead silence. Videsse exited the forward cockpit of the black ship, a determined stride carrying her. She walked briskly to the hut, her helmet in one hand, and the canister of street medicine in the other.

PZ-85 met her in the doorway. He was an awkward protocol droid; a protocol droid with no protocol. His angular arms rested inhumanly at his sides, and his head pivoted slightly on his long neck as he located and followed Videsse's arrival.

"How's she doin', Peezee?" Videsse asked in a hushed voice.

"It appears that she is stable, but you know, I am not a medical droid," the droid began. "Her condition is unimproved, but she is not deteriorating."

Videsse nodded. "Thankyou, Peezee." She brushed past him and threw her helmet. The helmet made a hollow and dead thud as it came to a rest on the table against the wall. Videsse swept into a rear room as PZ-85 hobbled a short distance behind her. The room was thick with darkness, palpable and stale. Light hurt the patient's eyes, so the windows were shut. In the corner, on a cot, lay a skeleton barely visible in shadow. Her thin arms wrapped over her chest, and her face sought the heavens beyond the permacrete roof. Except for the heaving of her chest, this undead form would have been mistaken for the deceased already.

Videsse lit a dim flame from a hand-held torch on a small table opposite her, and then knelt beside her mother, her clone prime, Terrah Otlell.

Terrah's thin eyelids and drawn face tried to squint under the oppressive yet feeble light, her hand awkwardly raising to protect her eyes. Her olive colored skin was pale, making her appear more grey than any natural tone, and her normally green eyes were almost blue with anemia. The muscles of her face drew back in an attempted smile when she saw her daughter beside her.

"Dess," she whispered. "You're back."

Videsse mirrored her weak smile but her shoulders were stiff and her movements abrupt. She shifted her knees as she knelt by the cot and removed a purple capsule from the canister and inserted it into a mask diffuser.

"Shh, ma," Videsse bid her. "Just breathe this in. It will give you strength."

She held the mask up to her mother's face and let her breathe in the produced mist. The grey purple mist wisped out the sides of the mask as she exhaled.

Terrah's chest heaved heavy at first, but within a dozen breaths it began to slow, and her color returned to a shade closer to normal, though she was still very pale. She looked less like a corpse and more like a specter.

"Thank you," Terrah exhaled. "That's better."

Videsse began to relax and exhaled herself, seeing her mother find some peace.

"There," Videsse quipped with relief. "With all the credits I got, you'd think they'd have something that would work better than what I can find on the street."

Terrah nodded and reached her hand up to Videsse's face. "All the credits in the world can't prevent everything."

Videsse took her mother's frail hand from her face and held it between her own. Their hands together displayed an oddity. They were the same, but drastically different. Identical in nature, Videsse being a clone of Terrah, but completely apart in experience. Terrah's hands were wasting away, her whole form was clinging loosely to this life as if the slightest breath of the Geonosian wind would blow her over the edge into the final abyss. Videsse's strong youthful hands held on in an attempt to anchor the frail dying hand to the living, holding her back from the fall.

"I hoped to make it into my sixties," Terrah whispered.

Videsse's brows furrowed and she pursed her lips. "Don't talk like that, ma. You'll beat this. You're a survivor. Like me. We'll find a way out of this."

Terrah nodded. "Find a way out. Like a trap." She took a deep breath that rattled slightly on inhalation. "This is not a trap anyone can escape, Dess. The hounds will finally catch me."

Videsse dropped her hand. "Shut up!" She stood up and clenched her hand. "Sod it all, ma. Stop talkin' like that. We beat those hounds, we'll beat this."

Terrah ceased speaking, and tried to sit up. Her weak arms pivoting her body as she swung her legs over the edge of the cot. Her gasping breaths stalled each movement as she did.

"Stop it," Videsse ordered. "What are you doing? You're not strong enough."

"I'm not strong enough to sit up, but I am strong enough to fight this illness? Which is it?" She looked Videsse directly in her eyes. "My own bones are killing me, so the med droids say. I can't make blood anymore. I _am_ going to sit up, it is one thing I can do." She managed to raise herself upright, as if lifted by straining wires. "Boba was lucky, the way he died," she continued with a soft tone. "Alone and quick in his quinto field. At least it was the way he would have wanted it."

"I don't know about that," Videsse argued. "I think he would have wanted to die in some gun slinging blaze."

"No," Terrah replied. "Not at the end. He found what he was looking for. He didn't need anything else. Though, Boba didn't want anyone with him at the end. Like he was when his father died. I don't think he wanted that for you. Though, can you imagine what he would have done if you were waiting on him at the end, telling him he couldn't sit up." She was not berating when she said these things, and even attempted a feeble laugh. "Though, I'm not complaining, Dess. Just, let me do what I can."

Videsse nodded and bit her lip. She hated seeing her mother this way. It seemed to her that she had just gotten her back from death, though it was six years ago. Now she was going to lose her again, this time permanently.

Terrah could read the lines of Videsse's drawn eyebrows and the corners of her mouth. "Forgive me, Dess."

Videsse looked at the floor and shook her head.

"Dess," Terrah implored. "Sit back down and look at me." She leaned forward on the cot.

Videsse lifted her gaze reluctantly, her eyes slightly wet on the sides. She took a seat, reticently by her mother's side.

"I should have been there for you," Terrah said. "I shouldn't have run away."

"Ain't nothin' to forgive," Videsse said with a shaking voice. "I'd have done the same thing."

Terrah nodded. "Maybe you would have. But I don't think so. You aren't exactly like me. A survivor, yes. But more than a survivor."

Videsse thumbed the back of her knees and then the tips of her fingers. "Whatever," she replied in a cracked voice. "I just-" her voice broke. "I just don't . . . want you to leave again."

Terrah's raised lips, squinted eyes, and arched brows showed the pain she felt at her daughter's words. Terrah had nothing of her own to reply. What could she say? What words were there that could hold back the winds, or strengthen her limbs, or support her from falling? Words were just a small breath, and this moment was a gale.

She raised her arm and put it around Videsse, drawing her in close. Videsse responded and leaned in, falling in slow motion as she, without intending to, came to rest her head on her mother's lap. This woman, a bounty hunter, trained by Boba Fett, with the genes of a clone trooper, this nineteen-year old woman who had fought and killed and survived, found a moment of rest accidentally on the knees of a dying woman. Terrah, in silence, gently unbound the braids of Videsse's hair, and smoothed it with her thin fingers.

Let us leave the two of them to their own sorrow. It is not considerate of me to dwell so long in their despair. Let them be. However, if that does not satisfy your curiosity and you find yourself desiring more than what I am willing to narrate, then let the little I have shared draw you into memories of your own loss for I know that if you are living (for it would be absurd to think the non-living would be audience to my story), you have suffered. Let the memory of that hopelessness and fear detail for you what Videsse and Terrah underwent. How it felt like drowning, or falling, or crushing. How, though hope was there, you could not see it in the darkness. How you would squint your feeble eyes in the dim light, and grasped with weak hands for some hope, that was, I assure you again, definitely there, but you could not or would not lay hold of it. How you grappled to find a cure to make your own escape, but were met only with impotent anesthetics. Let those memories guide you to the soul state of our heroine and her mother. Those memories are not completely sufficient to give you the full description of their despair, but it is the only tool I leave you with for understanding. Only remember, though you cannot see it or feel it now, hope is part of this story, and it is part of yours as well.

As for Terrah, did she die that day? It would have made the narrative flow nicely if she had, but I am simply conveying the truths and cannot alter them for dramatic effect. She passed away eight days later at a moment when Videsse was harvesting the quinto grain. Videsse was not with her at the moment of her passing. She was running through the tall dead stalks, as fast as her legs could carry her back to her shelter. She ran as PZ-85, again, waited by the door, having called her home. She disappeared into the hut and the droid disappeared also, as gusts of dust clouds swept past. The wind cried an unusual wail that day, almost as if a child was crying, a very unnatural sound for the wind to make, but that was what was in the air that day. I simply record what could be heard.


	5. Episode X Street Ranat

"Stop!" A gruff voice called out into the crowded alleys of Nar Shaddaa. "Thief!"

It was a wasted alarm call. No one cared. An Anx, a hunched reptilian species with a thick tail and an elongated head emerged from a side shop. He squinted into the crowd and sniffed, searching for the culprit, his sense of smell compensating for his nearsightedness. Though the crowd's stench rose to the edge of the galaxy, he thought he could just barely perceive the thief's fragrance nearby. The stocky alien pushed a few travelers gruffly as he headed toward a shop two doors down.

"I can smell you, street ranat!" He threw a short and unsuspecting Sullustan out of the way, who tripped over his own feet and into a trinket stand adding a resounding crash of metal pings and clangs to the paradoxical symphony of chaos. A boisterous ruckus ensued between the trinket owner and the poor Sullustan. Fists were thrown, and perhaps a blaster was brandished.

Then, as if materializing from another dimension, a child emerged from under the long robe of a distracted Twi'lek. In a flash, the brown-haired, blue-skinned kid cut through the crowd as if he had wings. His unkempt hair could just barely be seen darting between travelers.

The Anx caught the scent and pursued the fleeing aroma of the child, throwing people to the left and right with his mighty arms.

"Stop that thief!" He called out. Again, the shout was wasted.

The alley was so crowded that the child had to zig-zag among the throng; a throng that the Anx could just throw aside. It was a race between the swift and the strong. Yet still, the Anx was gaining with slow progress.

The child looked back to see, but he was too short to get a good look. Then the Rhodian behind him fell forward onto his face, like a toppling wall, and the sniffing Anx was there. He stepped on the back of the Rhodian and reached for the boy.

"There you are!" He snarled, his sharp fingers approaching the boy's neck.

The child dropped to his hands and knees and scurried under another alien lifeform, one with four legs, whatever it was. He rushed to the other side, stood up and ran looking behind him, as he crashed into a fruit stand. He looked up to see the massive Besalisk owner finishing a deal with a patron. The boy quickly grabbed a honey melon from the table, and turned, throwing it into the hands of a Jawa that was behind him. Then the child took off.

The movement was so quick, that from the time that he crashed into the stand and placed the melon in the Jawa's hands, the Besalisk had looked up and seen the Jawa turning to throw the melon in the direction of the fleeing boy.

"You gonna pay for that!" the Besalisk roared and before anyone could see how it happened, the Besalisk was in the middle of the alley, on top of the Jawa, and throwing bystanders like mud sods.

The Anx ran straight into the mess of bodies and was caught up in the Besalisk's rage, catching one of his four elbows in the jaw and falling back into the dust and mire of a street battle.

The child rushed into an open door about ten meters further and bent over to catch his breath.

"What do you get yourself into, Cam H'darr?" He asked himself under his breath. He wiped the sweat from his forehead and stood up. He was a handsome boy, about the age of eleven. His brown hair and almost black eyes contrasted his slightly blue skin. A row of three tattooed lines ornamented his lower jaw on each side, distinguishing him from other near-humans his age. A near-human, that _is_ what he was. _He_ did not even know exactly what he was. Somewhere in the blend of the galaxy gene pool, he was conceived. Not knowing who his parents were, or what they were, he simply was Cam H'darr, of the H'darr species he would say. He did not even know where his name came from. Like himself it was a mystery so he would say. He wore a synthetic and skin-tight white shirt, with a brown leather vest, fully pocketed. His pants were also laden with pockets and durable. The clothes were new. Of course they were, they were just stolen from the Anx that was presently becoming acquainted with the gravel streets of Nar Shaddaa. Cam looked down at his muddy and unshod feet and sucked in his lips. There was something else he needed to rectify.

"Can I help you?" a raspy voice spoke followed by a few organic clicks.

Cam looked up to see the store owner, a spider-like Harch. With four of his six arms on the transaction desk, supporting his leaning thorax. The other two furry arms stroked his chelicerae which hung down like a bushy mustache.

Cam darted his gaze around the shop. It was a general shop that sold most items, from clothes to blasters, to candy. Stands and racks were crammed into the small space like a warehouse, uncomfortable for a humanoid, but very satisfying for an arachnid. Cam's wandering eyes happened to spy a pair of boots. His face inadvertently smiled. They weren't much, made of an animal hide material, but fitted with metal ankle supports and toe reinforcements. They would withstand the punishment Cam would put them through.

"Yeah, Mustache, how much for those boots." Cam pointed to the objects in question.

The shopkeeper clicked in disapproval and then looked at Cam's muddy feet. "Two hundred."

The price was obscene and Cam knew it, but without showing signs of angst over the cost he shrugged his shoulders.

'That's too bad," he sighed. "My mother sent me out to get new clothes, and I spent all of it on these." He gestured to his current outfit. "I guess I only have enough for some of that jogan fruit candy."

The Harch squinted its multiple eyes in suspicion and studied Cam for a moment. The pupil-less red eyes gave no indication of exactly what feature the Harch was looking at. Finally, he turned his glance to the jars of fruit candy sticks that resided in clear jars behind him. "Sure, but don't call me Moustache. How many?"

"How much are they?" Cam produced a few credits and the shopkeeper spied them.

"That'll get you three," the shopkeeper clicked.

"Then, that's what I'll get, Stache," Cam announced with a grin.

The Harch looked obviously upset about the insolence but turned to get the candy. He grabbed three from the jar.

"Second thought, I want the barabel fruit sticks, Stache."

The Harch grunted and clicked again in irritation, replaced the jogan sticks, and removed some barabel ones. "You call me that one more time and you'll be licking your wounds." He turned and slammed the fruit sticks on the table. No one was there. The boy was gone. He looked to the stand that held the boots. They were gone as well.

Now, he slammed two of his fists on the table and burst toward the door in a rage and swept himself into the alley taking a few steps out of view to the right.

Then, quietly and like a flash, Cam emerged from behind a crate, the boots on his feet. He lept over the splintered counter and grabbed a handful of the fruit sticks and darted for the door, planning to disappear to the left. He stopped short though, as he saw a dark figure pushing the shopkeeper back to the shop. The Harch, more concerned with the man that was driving him than with his shop door, did not notice Cam in the doorway a few meters away. There was no time. Cam ran back into the shop and dove behind the shop table, trying to hide in one of its cubbies. He anxiously sucked his lips in and silently cursed his bad luck.

"I didn't know you were coming," the Harch exclaimed as he was pushed almost onto the dusty floor of his shop. "I really wasn't trying to dodge you."

A black-robed man followed closely behind him. He wore a smooth, dark faceplate covering his appearance, more for anonymity than for any function. A black canvas cloak covered his head and shoulders, waving behind him as he pushed the shopkeeper forward again. They entered the shop, the Harch's scuffing feet sweeping the floor. The dark man's heavy metallic footfalls followed close behind. The man's voice was sharp and precise. "Suspicious, don't you think, Tiden?" He asked another robed figure behind him. The second man stopped in the doorway and turned to watch the crowds. He said nothing.

"Sir, believe me," the Harch begged. "I was chasing a thief." His voice shook, making the clicking noise flutter.

"Thief, huh," the man stated. He looked around the crowded shop, evaluating what a thief would find worth stealing.

"Yes, yes. He stole a pair of boots from that shelf." The Harch pointed to a vacant stand across from him.

The man shook his head and looked back to the shopkeeper, his vague faceplate hiding any emotion. His voice was controlled, and like the faceplate, it perfectly hid any feelings. "A problem you can afford to ignore at the moment. You risk losing something more valuable right now, Ras" He stepped toward the shaking shopkeeper.

Ras stepped back and leaned against the counter, trying to put more space between himself and the dark man. The table jostled under the weight of Ras shaking Cam as he hid beneath it. He covered his mouth, sucked in his lips, and held his breath. He could not see what was happening but sensed that the man in black was leaning in on Ras. The counter continued to shake.

"You are indebted to me, Ras," the man spoke calmly. "I mean you have withheld what is mine."

"Wha-what do you mean?" Raz stammered. He reached behind the counter with one of his arms. Cam looked above him to see a stun rod fixed under the table. The Harch's claw stretched toward Cam, just missing the baton. Cam slunk down to the floor, his knees rising up, as he tried to avoid the hairy appendage.

"Your intelligence," the man continued. "Was. . . less than satisfactory. The Trandoshan mechanic knew nothing of the ship."

"Uh," Ras stumbled, half of his mind was elsewhere with his wandering claw. The other half of his mind was cursing that Felga the Hut would not allow him to protect himself with a blaster. "He lied to you, Nolan. Donal does know. I remember that ship."

Nolan cocked his head as if in thought. What he was thinking shall remain a mystery to us and to the shopkeeper, for at that moment Ras swung his arm around, stun baton in hand, and leveled it toward the head of the man in black. The blow never fell.

Cam could hear an electric hum throb through the air and the wall in front of him lit red. Cam was confused. What was that, a red bolt from a blaster? But that was not the sound of a blaster, he thought. Two dull thuds followed, and the counter ceased shaking. Cam reasoned the Harch was dead, though he did not know how. He lay perfectly still, his back on the floor of the cubby, his knees up, and his hands firmly placed over his mouth. The counter creaked as it shifted from the fall of the shopkeeper.

"What did you do, Nolan!" the second man at the door derided. "Felga's going to be upset you killed one of her bought shopkeepers."

Nolan did not reply. His definite footfalls moved toward the door slowly.

"She's going to revoke our privilege. Maybe even kick us off her moon, or worse," the second hooded man continued.

The splintered counter creaked again at the pressure of Cam's weight.

Nolan turned sharply but did not immediately walk to the counter.

Cam could hear the electric hum, again. The boots began to move and drew closer to the counter. Red light again lit the wall, casting the angular brown shadow of the shop counter. Cam's heart pounded within him. He could feel the pulsing of his blood in his temples. He had to do something. Without a second thought, he righted himself and hurtled out of the cubby; hands and feet racing to move toward the door. It was valiant, and stupid, and not graceful in the least, as he stumbled over the body of the Harch; the two separated segments of his body. A blinding red light met his face and stopped him in his tracks with his legs still on top of Ras's divided body. It was a saber, a saber of red light with two red gleaming crossbar vents just above the hilt. Cam had never seen anything like it, but he knew whatever it was, sliced Ras in half in a split second. Cam froze.

"Ah," Nolan said. "The boot thief." He turned to look at the second man. "You see, Tiden," he stated reticently. "The Dark Side has provided. The search for the Lady's ship will continue. It is ordained. In restitution for the shopkeeper, the Dark Side has given us an offering to give Felga; a slave."


	6. Episode X Labor of Life

It was night on Geonosis; a black, yet dimly jaundice night common to most ringed planets. Its rings glowed unnaturally at the horizons where the shadow of the planet did not hide their pale light. They looked like sharp spears that extended a quarter of the way into the night sky on each side; the rest of the continuous rings were as black as the stygian emptiness of space. Only six of the fifteen moons could be seen in their waning gibbous phase, adding less light than would be expected, as if the void of space actively drained their strength. The dingy landscape was covered with shifting and coalescing shadows caused by the ethereal light of the heavenly bodies. These shadows on the umber landscape made it appear as if apparitions were hiding behind each rock and spire. Even the wind appeared to be affected by them as it remained still and silent, not wanting to draw the attention of any of these undead spirits. It seemingly preferred to hide its presence from the specters that were peeking from behind any and every rock. The wind being unnerved; it is an amusing thought. Perhaps, it may remind you, as it does me, of our own trepidation in the twilight. If only our souls were free of that malady.

Somewhere in shadow, Videsse's hut rested about a kilometer to the east and her barren quinto grain field resided in the blackness on its far side. Beyond that, the giant mammoth ridge of the valley rose, black and ominous, as if it was a swell threatening to cover the invisible residence under a deluge of stone and dust. The opposite cliff face on the west of the plain stood just behind us, if you are willing to imagine it and then turn to face it. Its rugged rock face towered twenty meters above, where its distant edge disappeared against the night sky, only the stars and the rings, beforehand mentioned, showing where the cliff ended and the universe began.

Beneath the cliff, settled in the flat earth at the bottom, two small mounds laid. They were just longer than a human body. And so it should be, for they were graves. Barely visible in the night, their dark forms, and darker shadows rested as if two individuals were simply lying down to rest under the stars. A thin pole could barely be seen rising from each mound's head a little over a meter, and atop each rested a helmet. If there was more light, it would be evident that on the left, the helmet was a vivid red with two large eye screens, a horizontal air filter over the mouth, and a small antenna rising from the occipital shield. It was Terrah Otlell's helmet, the one she wore when Videsse had accidentally met her six years ago. The other grave, it will be no surprise, was Boba Fett's, and his green Mandalorian helmet rested on top of his grave marker, tilted down slightly as if it was contemplating.

It is not an uncommon occurrence to visit the dead, nor is it uncommon to feel as if the dead are still with us, somewhere just outside of our perception, listening and watching. That feeling, though, is easily overcome by our higher mental faculties and dismissed with any real thought as a romantic trick of our emotions. However, it must have been the dim light of the moons and rings, for it looked like the inhabitants of these graves were simply lying under a thick bed cover. Of course, that is just fanciful thinking as I have alluded to. Everyone knows, corpses are nothing more than base elements tending toward decay. But did you see, or was it just a trick of the light? Could I convince you that the mounds shifted, just slightly, just enough to imagine that the sleepers had taken a breath? The thought is horrid, however strangely alluring. Let us sit and watch attentively, for the more closely we watch the more the shadows will play tricks on our eyes, and the better we can be deceived to believe. The mounds were not smooth but covered with small rocks that fit together in a patchwork-like pattern. Dust and sand had settled in the gaps between the rocks that Videsse had so tenderly placed when she had buried the deceased. The dust was thin and could be stirred like a sheet, and if you would just glance at the shadow on the far edge of Boba's bed carefully; could it be that it looked like fingers, maybe a hand. Is it moving? No. Perhaps, it was just an eskrat, a progeny of one that had stowed away on the bounty hunter's ship and survived on quinto grain. Videsse's quinto grain was the only thing they could survive off of on this planet. And yet, it would be easy to imagine that it _was_ a hand and that it _did_ move, just a hint, and that Boba was a moment away from uncovering the sheet of his grave, and rise again to stand in the strength of the man he was intended to be, maybe even shining forth as the sun to brighten this eerie night.

Again, it is a fantasy-one brought on by the hint of the real rising sun behind us, for time has gotten away from us and the sky had begun to brighten with its rosy-fingered dawn at our backs and the dull rings stretched further overhead. Let us shift our gaze now to Terrah's grave. It could be observed that the shadows were getting sharper and more defined. The illusion that these graves were moving can be seen to be an obvious absurdity. And yet, even with our most acute faculties, it can not be denied that a dark umbrage seemed to rise from Terrah's grave. This was no trick of the night sky nor a superstitious anxiety producing our own hallucinations. Slowly, a shadow stretched from the grave, head first, then the dark shoulders and arms rose, as it passed from her grave over the ground behind and then up the cliff face wall. The shadow limped and stumbled as it grew in size. It was definitely feminine in form, with shoulder-length hair. Could this be the specter of Terrah, dark and dire?

The sound of a footstep behind us laid the question to rest. Videsse was approaching from the east, limping slightly on her right leg, an injury she compensated for with an augmentation to her armor when she wore it. The red sun was glowing behind her and her stretching shadow went before. She had a bottle of Cheedoan whiskey in her left hand, and took a quick sip, wiping her mouth after. She walked up and stood silent over the two graves, rubbing her free fingers together and biting her lip. She was quiet for a while and appeared as if trying to think of something to say until finally she shook her head and whispered to herself, "Whatever." It had been four months since her mother had died, and since the day she had buried her, she came every morning to the graves. Every morning the whiskey came with her as well. She poured an ounce onto Boba's grave.

Videsse turned to face the sunrise and sat down between the graves, stretching her feet out in front of her and taking a few more sips of the whiskey. "You know," she said out loud. She wanted to say something again but held her peace. The graves laid silent and motionless, holding their peace as well; perhaps, waiting for Videsse to finish what she was desiring to say. After twenty more minutes of sitting without a sound and imbibing the amber liquor, she lifted herself up and finished the last of the whiskey in one large gulp that expanded her cheeks. Some of the liquor escaped her lips and she wiped it with her forearm. Finally, after swallowing, she said, "Maybe, I'll see you tomorrow." She limped back to the hut, staggering a little more than when she came. The labor of the quinto field waited for her; the labor of life did not.


	7. Episode X The Quinto Grain

She made her way back to the hut where her black ship, the _Vigilance _slept nearby, taking longer walking than when she had left. Her other ships, the _Millennial Falcon_ and _Slave-1_ were housed in a cave she called the _Eyrie_ about five kilometers away. She dropped the whiskey bottle at the doorway instead of entering, and moved like a wraith toward the quinto field. PZ-85 emerged from the darkness of the hut, his image showing like a man walking out of his tomb. He had heard the bottle drop at the front door and came to see Videsse.

The droid had watched the change in her these last four months, and though only a protocol droid, he recognized that he also was losing something. He was losing a little more of Videsse every day.

"Mistress Dess?" To refer to her as _mistress_ and to use the name only those who loved her had done was awkward. Soon, he knew he would refer to her as Videsse, and then by her last name, and ultimately, he may not address to her at all. The feelings of a droid are foreign to men, even to me as the narrator. So I will confess my inability to describe what was occurring in the circuitry of a manufactured product; what a sentient programmer might have included in his operating system that could make him capable of sorrow. Why would a programmer do such a thing is beyond me; if in fact he or she did. His slower walk, his lowered head, his careful speech (relatively careful for him); were these things a reflection of real sorrow for losing what was left of Videsse? Or did they just look that way? Are we just imagining that we see something where there is nothing, like the shadows behind the rocks?

Videsse did not stop walking at PZ-85's address.

"Uh, Mistress Dess," PZ-85 said again. "If you are thinking of working the quinto field, may I suggest you wait a w-while for you to sober?"

"Shut up, Peezee." The reply was cold and dead.

"Oh," PZ-85 muttered in a low voice. He turned to reenter the hut, but he could not help making one comment. It was just loud enough for Videsse to hear, but low enough so it sounded as if he was just talking to himself. "I j-just thought you might plow straighter rows if you waited a bit. B-But quinto harvesting is not in my programming- obviously."

Videsse did not answer. She had heard, but she did not care. There were rows to plow and she wanted to be alone presently.

The field was not much of a field at that time. The season for growing had passed months ago, and the ground was now hard. Fertile soil was not existent on Geonosis, so the soil had to be brought in from other systems around the galaxy. It cost a fortune to do, but Videsse had a fortune to do it with, and when Boba and Terrah were alive, it was a family occupation worth the expense. They had all managed the field together and made a slight profit from it. Now, the soil was calloused, unyielding, and covered with the blown sand of the desert.

The hover plow was parked next to one of the dozen vaporators needed to irrigate the grain. It was grimy with dust and wind had heaped a drift of sand on one side, having not been used in a season. Videsse had not bothered to shelter it over the last season, her mother needing more care. Some things did not need to be done.

She wondered if the rust red plow would even start after the year of being battered by the sun, wind, and sand. Did it have any life left in it? Did our heroine? The plow did have a few things left in it from the last time it was used: Boba's EE carbine rifle snuggly holstered under the console, a pair of sand goggles on the seat, and a pint canister of whiskey, Videsse's whiskey in Boba's canister. Of course, Videsse noticed the whiskey laying on the console inside the operator's cabin. It would adequately supply her with a few more hours of a comfortable numbness.

"Thanks, Boba," she said out loud as she moved her body into the operating chair and swept up the goggles. She put them on and then took the canister in her hand, the light of the late morning sun reflecting off of it onto her face. She could hear her mother tell her she did not need it, but she brushed off the thought. Videsse took a sip, a conservative sip for her this morning. She closed her eyes and allowed herself to almost imagine that Boba and her mother were back at the hut and that she was secretly enjoying some of Boba's liquor like she used to do when working the field. She pretended to believe that he would kill her if he knew and Terrah would be so disappointed when she found out. But they never did find out, at least Videsse did not think they ever did.

Videsse opened her eyes and threw the canister back onto the console. She took a deep and slow breath.

"Here goes nothing," she said to herself and leaned over to hit the ignition switch. The engine coughed and died. She hit the ignition again. It repeated its epileptic fit and died. Videsse shook her head but tried once more. The engine lurched and whined as if it wanted to live but did not know how. Videsse then stomped on the floor with her good leg, while she held her finger on the ignition. The hover plow coughed again and then started to vibrate rhythmically. It was a slow rhythm at first but it sped up into a nice purr while Videsse held the ignition switch in place. After two minutes of allowing the engine to catch its stride, Videsse released the ignition and let it idle for another few minutes.

"Sounds like the condenser line. Looks like you need a bit of work." Videsse leaned back while it idled and took a few more sips from the canister. "Don't we all."


	8. Episode X The Raid

PZ-85 was right. The rows were not straight. It was now late in the afternoon, and the heat of the sun bore down on the hover plow producing ethereal heat waves that rose from the top of the russet metal. Videsse was hungry, and tired, and hot, and not a little drunk. Although considering our heroine's state, it was remarkable that the rows were as parallel as they were. The hover plow crept along, its ventral air blade carving a moderate trough into the cracked ground and revealing the black imported fertile soil.

Videsse leaned forward, resting her left arm on the console and her chin on her arm. With her right hand, she guided the control arm. The whiskey canister laid empty on the floor by her feet. She raised her head a little, yawned, stretched her left arm, and shook her cramped hand before returning it to the original position. Only a few more rows and she was finished.

A low squeal suddenly cut through the engine humm, the telltale pitch of her comm's alarm. An observer sitting next to Videsse, like we are, would not consider it a low squeal, rather a blaring alarm. However, to her, it sounded distant. Did you not hear that piercing electronic cry, Videsse? Were you so tired or deeply under another influence, that the alarm from your comlink sounded so dull? Yet, that was what it looked like. She slothfully turned her head and stopped the plow. She reached to her belt and detached it, the red light flashing and reflecting off the entire interior of the operating cabin. Her thumb flipped open the communication flap as if she was flipping a coin.

"Yeah, Peezee," she said with a huff. "What now?"

"Uh, M-Mistress Dess," PZ-85 stammered. "I believe we have a visitor. It appears to be a moderately sized ship- a M-Marrak starship approaching from the eastern sector."

The information traveled down her auditory nerve to her whiskey-soaked brain, where it was processed. Somewhere in her, the deep instinct of survival overcame the mental stupor, awakening the young bounty hunter who had grappled with kidnappers, hounds, and pirates. Now, Videsse woke up. Her heart seemed to overcome the physical state she was in, as her adrenal glands fueled it with adrenaline. Fresh blood filled her face and limbs with every heartbeat. If anything was constant in Videsse, it was the drive to survive, even if it meant fighting for a life not worth living. Though to label a life not worth living is a definition that can not be absolutely defended. She shook her head and sat up straight. "Armed?"

"Yes," PZ-85 replied. "Looks like Hornet model. I-I don't think it's here for quinto."

"No, no it's not," Videsse quipped as she lowered her sand goggles over her eyes. "Raiders."

She swiped up the carbine rifle and checked the charges. "Still good," she stammered in disbelief.

"Pardon," PZ-85 questioned over the comlink.

"Just get into the Vigilance and start her up. I'll be there in a flash," Videsse ordered. "And activate that destroyer droid programming while you're at it."

She threw open the cabin door and rushed out, her foot tripping on the edge of the top step. Though her mind was waking in fight or flight, her coordination did not. She fell face first in the dust, and recovered gracelessly, somehow regaining an upright posture.

"Sod it!" she exclaimed and ran toward the hut, her slight limp evident. She grimaced her teeth as she ran and swallowed the sharp pain of the tight scar tissue from her left thigh. She thought of the time years ago, when she had been injured in that leg and her mother advised her to get a bacta tank treatment to heal the wound. Of course, she did not listen.

A high pitched wail preceded the black starship as it materialized behind her descending through the jaundice clouds. It cut through the air overhead in a sharp line toward her hut a hundred meters away. Videsse looked up but continued to sprint as best she could.

The ship looked insect-like, with two lateral stabilizers from both sides, each with a sublight engine at the extremities. The cranial cockpit appeared large enough to accommodate at most six crew members. With a narrow joint, the aft section of the ship angled down slightly like an abdomen and was equipped with a hyperdrive engine at the stern. Videsse recognized the ship as a new model, and more expensive than most raiders could afford.

However, before she could assess the ship further, it had soared over her hut, discharging a half dozen green laser blasts into the dwelling. A mushroom of fire bloomed as shattered pieces of plastocrete, rocks, and dust showered the nearby terrain. The black plume rose into the air, tethered by a thin line of smoke.

Thirty meters away, Videsse stopped for half a second to witness the explosion. She lifted her sand goggles off her face and wiped her eyes before replacing them.

"They ain't raiders, then," she said to herself. A gust of wind blew in between her and the nonexistent hut. She ran into the gust and tried to keep up with it until she could get behind one of the large boulders scattered throughout the valley. She fell to her knees behind one. The dust blew away. She tried to shake off the double vision and shouldered the butt of the rifle. The sounds of the starship landing could be heard; the crunching of the dry ground under its landing supports, the hiss of steam vents and the metallic lowering of a side ramp. She peeked out from behind the rock. Three men exited the craft, each clad in a black cape and hood. Their faces were covered with smooth dark face shields and each had rifles of their own, which they held up, ready to fire on any defender. They headed for the _Vigilance._

"They want the ship, huh?" Videsse remembered Donal's warning months ago about dark men looking for the _SS-64_. "Sod it all. Should have kept her in the Eyrie."

Videsse waited for the wind. It was not long. A dust cloud swept over her from the east. She stood up and blindly fired on the three men from the veil of the dust. She could hear one scream in pain.

"Gotcha," she said, then ceased firing and ran with the cloud to another rock a few meters away diagonally to her left and toward them. Again, she hid from their view. The trick worked. The cloud passed, but the two uninjured men fired on the other boulder. She wanted to wait for another gust of wind and repeat the trick one more time, but she could hear one of the men call out, "Just get in the ship and get it out of here. I don't care if you're hurt."

There was no time. She again stole a glance from her cover. The injured man twenty meters away had been hit in the side and he had his left arm wrapped around his abdomen. He was already lowering the lift with his other hand and started to ascend it awkwardly. In an hour or two he would have been dead, but a blaster went off and the man reeled backward feet over his head and then face down in the dust. The second man cried out, "There's a droid on the ship!"

The last man used a comlink to address the pilot in the _Hornet_, "Rasha, get above us and take out the shooter." He turned to the remaining man at his side as he returned the commlink to his belt. "Stenrir, we need to ion pulse the ship."

Stenrir tilted his head as if in thought.

"Did you hear me, Stenrir. Pulse that ship!" the order came again.

"But we'll disable it, Nolan," Stenrir objected.

"Only for a few minutes, get-"

Half of a dozen red blaster bolts flashed through the air, three of them slicing through Stenrir and spraying a mist of red blood into the yellow air. His limp body crumpled to its knees and then to the dust.

Nolan darted his gaze to the boulder where the shots had come from and reached for another weapon at his side. Dropping his rifle, his hand found its home on a black blade hilt. He ignited the red cross-blade of a lightsaber and held it in front of him with both hands like a shield. In an unexpected way, it was his salvation, for at that moment Videsse had her sights on him, and though she was not steady, she was about to unload another dozen rounds; one was sure to meet its target. However, when she saw the blade, she paused, half mesmerized. She remembered a weapon like that in the hands of her captor, the Keeper, eight years ago. She was alone then, no one was there to save her; like she was alone now. She remembered the Keeper coming for her, the smell of burning metal as he slashed at the ground, the immense green creature approaching, his sharp retractable teeth smiling in a lecherous grin, and the pale light of that kind of weapon glowing off his face. It was the weapon of a Jedi she was told; the Jedi that was frozen in the Keeper's carbonite; the blind Jedi. She did not know what it meant, and she was not mentally equipped at the moment to decipher it. The invasive thought, a nightmare from her past, incapacitated her for half a second; long enough for her to lose her chance at killing the man.

The whinny of an ion pulse grenade broke her thought and she could see electric threads dance over her ship in erratic spirals before snuffing out. The ship and PZ-85 were disabled.

She gritted her teeth and growled. "You ain't gonna get my ship!" She would not allow herself to think of the dark men taking her droid. Her body jolted out from behind the sandstone boulder and she blindly fired without caution. Red blasts rained from her rifle but were ultimately wasted, for in front of her, hovering three stories in the air was the black and threatening _Marrek Hornet_, its cannons aimed fixedly on her.

Her eyes widened and mouth dropped. "Sod it all," she said to herself and dove back behind the boulder, wrapping her arms around her knees and ducking her head down. "Please, let this boulder hold-"

The concussion hit her as if the whole planet had suddenly tried to sweep her off the terrain and into space; an infinitely hard force, and in an infinitesimal of a second, shorter than the time for synapses to convey a message from her eyes to the recesses of her brain. She did not hear the explosion, nor see the ground move under her. Later she would only recollect the concrete impact on her back and considered how it must have felt at the end of a fall from a hundred meters when the ground finally met the body, the immovable and the ethereal meeting in an instant. She remembered nothing else as she fell from that cliff into a great white unconsciousness.

But death did not take her. No, death is a funny thing in that way. It only pretended to claim her; a ruse at a moment when our heroine had desperately hoped to die more than ever before. Instead, it fled from her to some other distant part of the galaxy, to claim another poor soul; someone that had been fighting desperately to escape death and now had finally been overcome, not into a great white unconsciousness, but into _the_ great white arms of eternity.

Oh, death, what a capricious force you are! How long before your reign ends? Perhaps though, to live when we would not is a grace given to each of us at least once in our lives. It certainly was for our heroine.


	9. Episode X Investigation

"_She is alive." A woman's voice._

"_Banged up, but she'll live." A man._

_Footsteps._

"_Dess."_

_Pressure on her back; a hand, perhaps._

"_You must survive." The woman.  
_"_Patch, wake up." The man._

_A dream._

"Don't. . . call me. . . Patch." Videsse's voice was weak as she spoke through her dry mouth, but the sound waves crashed into her eardrums and throbbed through her head, the pain rebounding over and over rhythmically in her skull. She became aware of her neck as she felt its muscles tighten and begin a spasming cascade down her back; a waterfall of pain and strain rolling.

She cried out in agony, causing not a waterfall, but now a tsunami of torture starting in her ears and descending distally to her toes. She bit her lip and tried not to make a noise and save herself from another convulsion of pain. It worked with the sharp bolts of pain, but as she ascended out of her stupor, the dull pain that she was swimming in began to rise. Nothing was free from it; her hands, arms, head, legs. The ache rose like the tide. She gasped and held her breath.

Her eyes opened, letting in a deluge of light from the late afternoon sun. Another swell of pain passed over her whole body and she closed her eyes reflexively. Tears began to pool in her goggles. She laid that way for another half of an hour, hopelessly undulating in the waves of turmoil.

Finally, she attempted a trial of moving her fingers. Even that was unbearable. However, she forced herself. The dust that had covered them began to move and her hands emerged. She squinted her eyes to only allow a sliver of light and rolled her head from one side to the other. She groaned and bit her lip almost to bleeding.

With another huff her elbows lifted and her arms weakly pushed her body up to her knees. More red dust fell from her like a fine shower. Her cramped muscles revolted to the movement, but eventually softened enough for her to rise to half of a stand. She leaned to the left and her arms hung limp in exhaustion.

She squinted through the light to see the remains of her dwelling. The shelter was gone, nothing but black and burnt remnants of plastocrete and the fading wisps of smoldering fires. The _Vigilance_ was gone and with it her droid. It all was swept away; everything except the two dead men. They were lying face down and their black capes feebly blew in the gusts of wind.

Videsse took one aching step, and then another, like a dead woman coming out of a grave. Her limping undead body traversed the twenty meters, a distance that may have been twenty kilometers for Videsse, and yet, with difficulty she found herself collapsed on her knees next to one of the dead men.

Whether from the pain or the whiskey or both, Videsse leaned over and promptly vomited onto the ground at the man's side. She cried out in agony again, experiencing a new sensation of pain at her inner core. She wiped her mouth and then propped herself up, taking a dozen deep breaths before investigating the body.

She labored to roll the man to his back with heavy breaths and frequent breaks. The dead man was starting to get stiff.

"I must've been out for hours," she said to herself after recognizing the rigor mortis setting in. Her voice was not as intense in her ears as it had been. It was a welcomed development, but still, she winced at the sound of it.

The face plate on the dead man was smooth and featureless with two bands that fixed snuggly to his ears. Videsse unfixed it and placed it on the ground next to her. The man's face was deep orange, with open white pupilless eyes. His hair was stark white and long, about shoulder length. Videsse had never seen a species like this before. She checked his belt to see if he had a lightsaber like the other man. There was none. His only weapon was the rifle. In fact, there was nothing else on him that would give any indication of who he was and why they came for her ship; just a black robe, a simple belt, vague mask, and his rifle; not even a commlink.

After him, eventually, Videsse finished her examination of the other man, with the same results. The only difference was that his white hair was braided. Those were the only insights she would get.

The pain began to be bearable and she realized then, how thirsty and weak she was. She was in no condition to walk to the Eyrie, so the harvester was going to have to do.

"But first," she said to herself, though did not finish her thought out loud.


	10. Episode X The Graves

The late afternoon and evening sun dipped below the western ravine of the valley making its shadow to extend beyond the graves that we had visited earlier and then further fifty meters into the center of the valley. The darkness was coming to this hemisphere and to our heroine. Videsse stood over the graves in the dark umbrage of the cliff, as silent as the dead; a wordless harbinger of the future, though, Videsse was never known for her wordlessness.

She broke the silence. "If you were there," she began and then stopped to take a breath as if in pain. "The _Vigilance_, the shelter. . . Peezee."

She rubbed the back of her neck and massaged it trying to undo some of the tension. Videsse then pursed her lips and crossed her arms over her chest.

"If you were there, this wouldn't have happened!" The air seemed to shake. She closed her eyes as her voice painfully echoed in her skull.

The graves made no reply, each helmet seeming to look slightly away from her emotionlessly. Would they have responded if they could? The wind blowing around them made it almost look as if they then turned toward her.

"Well," Videsse continued. "Now what am I to do? I don't even know who they were? Whatever." She shook her head and kicked some dust with her foot, then ceased as if a thought dawned on her.

"Donal," she whispered. "If they found me that means they got to Donal."

Her fists clenched and fire rose in her eyes. She could almost hear the voice of her mother trying to dissuade the growing drive. "Don't get involved. Survive."

Videsse shook her head. "I know what you would say, mother." She turned to look at Boba's helmet hanging from the post above his grave.

"And you, what would you say?" Her voice was full of disapprobation.

The wind seemed to move his helmet again as if it nodded ever so slightly. So slightly that we might even say that it did not move.

"I thought so," Videsse said to the air. She clenched her teeth, lowered her arms, and remade two tight fists. "Sorry, mother. Boba's right on this. Someone's gotta pay."

Was she really speaking to the spirits? An absurdity, I assure you, however, I am aware that you may have thought as much, it being likely that you have been told such stories before. Or was she beginning to lose her mind? That is far more likely, but also incorrect. Must I ask this question? Yet, with just a slight effort of thought, I realize that I must: have you never spoken to yourself, to the wind, to the dead? Is it so strange that she would do so? And have you not at a time of loss and despair found yourself speaking to the great abyss even more, hoping even that someone, something from the invisible realm might speak back? And is it so foreign to you that at a moment like that, one might suspect that one had actually gotten a reply? So let us give our heroine some grace in this, for we have often extended that same grace to ourselves without question.

Videsse, then, finishing her conversation, turned to limp back to the harvester with one more comment. "Don't worry. I don't need either of you. I'll do it myself." The helmets remained behind, watching the harvester start up then move slowly across the valley to a distant slope that would take it up; up out of the valley, to the Eyrie where a new destiny awaited.


	11. Episode X A Hunter's Preparations

The Eyrie, as Videsse and Boba called it, was an abandoned hive of the bug-like Geonosians; a species that had been exterminated by the Empire almost fifty years earlier. The Eyrie's opening resided on the side of another narrower valley and was large enough for a moderately sized ship like the _Falcon_ to enter. Its broad opening was unusual for the small-statured Geonosians, but Boba had done some explosive excavating to make room for the freighter after he had acquired the ship during the Second Galactic War. He had also installed a holographic emulator to create a rock wall mirage over the entrance, but over the last year, Videsse had stopped replacing its power cells. Thus, the gaping maw of the cave remained unhidden in the faint nocturnal light as Videsse's harvester climbed the incline toward it.

With effort, the harvester crept into the shelter of the Eyrie and exhausted, it came to rest a few meters within the entrance. Dust entered with it and slowly disappeared into the floor like a falling bed sheet before Videsse emerged. The night was finally upon Geonosis, and the reflected light of its celestial rings did nothing to illuminate the cave. Videsse, however, knew her way around it well and walked in the darkness to the eastern wall, lit a display panel and powered the dome lights.

With a flicker, pale blue lights bathed the Eyrie, a few shadowmoths fluttering away into the dark recesses. Like the eskrats, these were another species that had hitched a ride on Videsse's starship from somewhere else in the galaxy. The full atrium was now visible, stretching half of a kilometer deep and wide and over a dozen meters high at places. In the center, a Corellian freighter slept with her companion, a Firespray starship; the _Millenium Falcon_ and _Slave-1_.

Multiple chambers and passageways were carved into the rear and side walls of the vast red cavern, and Videsse limped her way to the first one a few meters beyond the light panel. There was a communication console and power control unit arranged against the wall of the recess, heavy wires running upward like vines into the rock ceiling.

Videsse quickly turned the communication console on and punched in location codes. A static cloud appeared on the dorsal holographic display.

"Donal," Videsse spoke to the grainy fog. She re-entered location codes for Donal's shop on Nar Shaddaa. "Maybe the dish is down. Come on. Donal, are you there?"

There was no answer. She checked the power display and ran a ping test on the surface communication disk. Everything was working.

"Sod it!" Videsse slammed the display with her fist, fearing the worst for Donal. She immediately regretted hitting the display as she winced at the pain. She shook her hand and held it to her chest. She bit her lip again, and fire reemerged in her eyes. With a purposeful stride, the limp less obvious, she left the commlink chamber, passed a housing chamber and approached a sealed durasteel door.

Videsse unlocked the door with a swipe of her palm on a mounted lock display next to the door and the steel barriers gasped as the seal was broken. It opened from the center horizontally and retracted into the ceiling and floor, leaving just enough lip that Videsse had to step over it. Lights lit automatically.

The room was filled with varying armors and helmets on one side, firearms opposite, and explosives detonators displayed on the far wall. In the middle was a steel chest. This was Videsse's armament. As I have said before, she had no wealth restrictions, and so neither did her weapon's arsenal. On the right wall rested ten carbine rifles, including the FF-89 carbine rifle, a successor of Boba Fett's favorite, though much lighter and more powerful. Next to the rifles were another dozen mid-range blasters common to most infantry units throughout the years, DC-17's and 15's; two-handed blasters that fired ionized plasma rounds. Newer, more predictable models also filled in the gaps, such as the sleek DC-27. Finally, there were six pairs of varying pistols, each small enough to be held in one hand, and each with a matching partner.

On the left wall there stood, like sentinels, four sets of armor. Videsse walked up to the first. It was short silver Mandalorian armor with her mother's red starburst on the shoulder plates. She ran her finger over it. It was too small for her to wear anymore, but she had kept it for sentimental reasons. This was the armor she wore six years earlier when she had been trapped on a pirate ship outside of the Teth system; the first time she had interacted with her mother in eight years. She stared at it for a moment, her green eyes looking a little more glass-like than usual. She let out an almost silent sigh and moved on, passing another set of black Mandalorian armor that she had crafted a few years ago, and then past another red set, until she finally stopped at the last one, the one we had seen her wearing earlier on the streets of Nar Shaddaa. It was obsidian black, the familiar red starburst on its shoulder, but the helmet was the only one that did not have the familiar, Mandalorian, T-shaped view screen.

Videsse began equipping herself with the armored leg brace and worked her leg in with effort. The black plated armor fit snugly over her legs. It was lean but strong, and unlike the other suits, it could deflect plasma bolts-if fired from a distance. Videsse opened a drawer in the central steel chest and removed a small power cell. She inserted it into a side port on her left thigh. The brace emitted metallic clicks at the hip and knee as power fueled the joints. Videsse smoothly raised her lame leg and bent her knee. The armored brace gave strength and fluidity to her leg movements and allowed her to function normally without a limp.

Videsse continued the process of equipping herself; slipping into a synthetic puncture resistant doublet, then her exterior breast armor and shoulder bracers. She carefully examined various gauntlets that hung behind the armor.

"Hmm," she said to herself. Her hands passed over the wrist-dart gauntlets and the gauntlets with the vibroblade sheaths before finding their way to the last pair. She removed one and opened the forearm compartment to evaluate. Two dozen thanatizine-primed midge droids slept in tight rows, waiting to awake and inject the sedative. "These'll do," she said.

Also, arranged on the wall behind the armor, were two jetpacks; the unpredictable and clunky Z-6 jetpack with its powerful concussion missile, and next to it the smooth-lined and compact S3. Videsse opted against either of these and slipped a cross-mounted rifle holster on her back. The FF-89 carbine rifle then found its way into it. However, our heroine did not completely reject the idea of flight, as she covered her feet with rocket-equipped boots, each with an inconspicuous vibroblade sheath on the lateral edge. These boots would give a shorter duration of flight than either jetpack, but with proper use, she could squeeze ten seconds of flight with each charge cartridge.

Videsse was almost finished. Two vibroblades ended up in her boot sheaths. A utility belt equipped with a rear-mounted cloaking device slid around her waist, tracking devices included. Three magno-floating cases of charges (smoke, physical, and ion) and another floating case of boot charges, and power cells were selected. Lastly, she donned her helmet, her blue eye screens charging to life as they helmet attached to the flexible power conduit that traversed her entire outfit.

She slid out of the armory, the floating cases of supplies following her. Turning to another recess she grabbed a few more items, a heated medical bacta-bag and two canisters of bacta.

"I've got six hours of lightspeed to waste, might as well try to heal up a bit," she commented. She was thinking like a bounty hunter again, and it felt good.

Finally, she activated a floating chest of rations and headed to the starships.

It seemed that the _Falcon_ looked on as she approached. She smiled under the helmet as she thought of this ship. She considered it to be her ship since she was the one that had brought it back to life eight years ago. She traced her hand on the underside of the hull that she had repaired.

"I wish I could take you with me, girl," she said to it. "But I can't fly you alone."

Videsse then looked to _Slave-1, _now decaled red and black. She sighed a breath in frustration. It was not that _Slave-1_ was not an adequate ship for her purpose; for without question it was more than capable for the exploits of a bounty hunter. However, it brought to Videsse's mind too many memories that she wanted to be free of. This was Boba Fett's ship, the ship he inherited when his father died; the ship that she now inherited from Boba and Terrah. It was the ship that her mother had obtained after she had stolen it; the ship that her mother had equipped with a droid AI fashioned after Boba's speech mannerisms; one of the many modifications she had made.

Videsse dreaded approaching _Slave-1_. She looked beyond it at a far wall, a carbonite cast of a kidnapper, The Keeper, hung there; the deep brown image clutching to the dismembered head of an assassin droid. It was another reminder of when Boba Fett had rescued her years ago.

"There are too many memories here," she said to herself. "Memories, I can't even leave behind." She looked back to the ship and reluctantly began loading the crates up the ventral ramp.

Once loaded, Videsse took her place in the tight cockpit and started the starship. The droid AI came to life with the flight console.

"What are we hunting today, Videsse?" the droid began.

"_Raider_, turn yourself off," Videsse said unequivocally. The droid immediately powered down, leaving the ship in Videsse's hands.

"I don't want to put up with your voice," she stated. "I'm gonna do this myself."


	12. Episode X Donal's Shop

Again we find ourselves on the Smuggler's Moon, Videsse rightly concluding that if they found her, the cloaked men had to have come by the way of Donal's shop. It would have surprised her if Donal gave up her location voluntarily, which he did not do; but she reasoned that they may have discovered information from the mech droid, or from his assistant, Timcamca, the Dug.

When Videsse arrived at Donal's shop, she found it in the same condition as her valley dwelling on Geonosis. The place where his shop used to stand was just a pile of black rubble, the fire and smoke long gone. The neighboring dwellings were charred, but not destroyed, as if a controlled fire was performed on Donal's shop. The juxtaposed shops were allowed to remain but Donal's shop was surgically burned. It was a statement. Not even one support beam of the edifice was allowed to stand.

Videsse ran with unabandon up onto the black pieces of plastocrete and melted durasteel searching for any evidence of Donal's body. It was a hopeless effort, any bodies would have been buried under at least a half of a meter of debris. Still, she continued, knowing the futility, but not relenting. Maybe she would even find Donal, hanging onto life by a thread. Her hands pushed aside large blackened rocks as she dug through what she could. More often than not, the unstable pile would shift as she disrupted it and fill in any work she had done.

It would seem plausible at this point that under her helmet some emotion was hidden; that she was searching ceaselessly for Donal because he was the only person left in the world that she cared about; that he would be the one hope of her resisting the lonely existence she was being propelled into. Of course, if you had asked her if that was why she searched with such urgency, I doubt she would admit it. Yet, perhaps it was so. Every handful of soot and rubble, perhaps, drew Videsse closer to what she was losing. Hours were spent; hope upon dashed hope. However, as if hope was titrated out in just the right amount to keep her persevering, her hands landed on the metal leg of Donal's mech droid, a gem in the rough.

Videsse lifted it from the rubble and pieces of dirt and soot fell from it. It was broken and battered beyond functioning. The head was bent and deformed, partially melted. Its arms and legs were twisted in an unpatterned knot. Videsse tried to turn it on, but it was no use. The droid was dead. She pulled a vibroblade from her right boot and worked the eight-inch blade under a metal door on its dorsal housing, looking for its data chip. It came loose with little effort.

"Maybe, I can learn something from you, little one," she said to herself, as she was in the habit of doing.

However, the data port was empty. Someone had removed it.

Videsse reasoned that this may explain how the cloaked men would have found her. It made her feel just a mite more satisfied thinking that Donal was not the source of her location. Though, it would have been smarter for Donal to have erased that data. He was never one known for common sense in matters like these. She spent a few more hours combing the debris to ensure that there was no sign of Donal. There was not. She would not allow herself to fully comprehend what that meant. We can postulate that either he was alive and simply not there, or perhaps he was under that debris, dead.

When Videsse was satisfied that not another handful of debris would reveal her old friend, she stood up and looked at her surroundings. A few Nar Shaddaa grifters were watching her, ready to take from her anything she might find in the pile. They would try. The rest of the population walked by as if the burnt shop meant nothing to them, and in fact, it did mean nothing. The crimelady (if you could call her a _lady)_, Felga the Hutt, had often ended proprietor's leases early, and destroyed dwellings were not uncommon on these streets. Nothing like this was ever performed without the knowledge and more importantly, the approval of Felga.

"My dear, Felga," Videsse gritted through her teeth. "It's time The Dark Star paid you a visit."


	13. Episode X Felga's Palace

The eleven-year-old alley thief we had been introduced to earlier now comes back into our story. Since we last saw the boy, he had been brought by the cloaked men to Felga and exchanged in payment for the dead Harch. Thus, Cam H'darr had now been in the Hutt's service as a slave for almost two weeks. Fortunately for him, he was allowed to keep the outfit he had stolen. Unfortunately, he was not allowed to keep the boots, one of Felga's hired smaller goons needing a new pair.

Service to Felga involved cleaning the waste strewn about by Felga's sham-proprietors, entertainers, and other lowlifes. No rations were provided for any of the slaves, and Cam's only means of sustenance was to eat whatever he found on the ground to clean up. Surprisingly, the hundreds of sweaty and greedy creatures that frequented Felga's atrium would dispose of most of the food provided to them, simply casting it on the floor. For Cam, this was a feast compared to life in the alleyway. He would swipe up the scraps into the many pockets on his vest and ate the bounty later. If caught eating on the job, his slave warden was sure to beat him until he threw the food back up. Then he was responsible for cleaning that up as well.

The real problem for the slaves was fresh water. Like the food, none was provided for him. At first, he tried to lap up water from any puddles in his sleeping cell. The slave quarters were beneath the main dwelling, and any mix of spilled drinks, mop water, or other fluids would sometimes find its way through cracks in the stucco ceiling and pool in the shallow depressions of the cell floor. The floor of Felga's entertaining hall was almost always wet with that amber cocktail. It was barely enough to sustain life, and Cam detested it.

However, Cam was raised by the streets, and what he wanted he would steal. There was no difference here. After a few short days, Cam had already managed to swipe a few things off of various goons, petitioners, and patrons. It was nothing grandiose, just a few decorative pins, some empty money pouches, a few miniature power cells, a tooth, a laser stylus, and one unspent blaster cartridge. Most of these things were useless, but the leather money pouches were water resistant, so he used them to hold drink. Shortly after he had pickpocketed the pouches, he slipped silently, being barefoot you remember, into the wine storage. Every day he could manage to fill the pouches two or three times after of course, he filled his stomach. The wine was not strong most of the time, luckily; but it did affect him, dampening his stealthy expertise.

That was the reason he was now thrust by his draconian slave ward onto the ground in front of Felga's glistening body pedicle. Cam fell on his face before the large slug-like crime-lady. She lounged on her padded sofa, her large head resting on her fist as she leaned to her right side. Felga was a green Hutt, with purple annular stripes starting at her midriff and extending down her tail. She smoked carababba tabac from a thin long stem holder to keep the smoke from her eyes. On her head sat a shimmering head cap that changed color depending on the light, and around her neck rested a purple feathered boa. She yawned and waved her right hand at the slave warden giving him permission to speak.

"Your Lady," the slave warden said as he bowed before her. He was a blue Twi'lek. One blue head tentacle wrapped over his chest and the second hung behind him. "I would not have bothered you. But, as you have requested, I am approaching you before I kill this slave of yours. You having the right and power over him. I humbly submit to your decision." He bowed lower, his front tentacle falling and touching the floor. Felga yawned again, then took another puff of her tabac. She remained silent and looked disinterested as she slowly moved her black dilated gaze toward and then away from both armed Weequays that stood guard at each side of her.

Felga's throne room was moderately sized and pillared. White stone pillars rose and supported the roof, which was decorated with a sprawling painted fresco. It revealed the repeated image of Felga performing heroic feats and earning bountiful rewards. Painted worshiping masses came to bow before her throned image. In one painting she sat above the circle of the universe holding scales in one hand and a sword in the other.

Here she sat like a Thala-siren sunning herself on a rock. She wiped her mouth from some drool that had escaped her mouth and puffed another breath of tabac. A tired young Trandoshan female fanned her with a dragonbird wing.

In the throne room, her guards stood by her side and a half dozen armed men hugged the wall. They waited for the sedated female to reply. The unnatural pause was not unusual, and only Cam felt unsure what to do in the silence. He studied the room trying to figure out what he should do. She finally looked at Cam, almost piercing through him as if not able to see him directly. She pushed herself upright; a Naboo whale trying to move after beaching on land.

Felga's raspy voice coughed a statement. "The boot thief of the third quarter."

The slave warden did not raise his head but spoke to the floor as he bowed even lower. "Yes, Your Lady. He was found in the winery, stealing your most sacred drink. The punishment is death."

Felga belched and shook her head as if the sound of her own eructation bothered her. She raised her hand and snapped. "Wine." The carnal soul of this creature, at the mere mention of wine, moved her without a seemingly rational will to request the drink. It is the primitive impulse, the uncontrolled desire of the flesh, I suppose.

Another young slave, a Togruta female, ran in from a side room with a yellow goblet and delivered it trembling as she did so. Felga's limp hands received it and the contents quickly disappeared into her gullet. The red Togruta disappeared just as swiftly.

"That's better," she commented as she wiped her mouth. Then with a wave of her hand, and a nonchalant comment directed into the air she spoke, "Dispose of the boot-thief."

The sentence was expected and Cam had played with death every day of his known life. He did not cower or plead for his life. No, his hands and feet did what they always did in situations like this. The slave warden, before he knew it, found the sharp point of Cam's stolen pin deeply embedded in his eye, and a blue humanoid leapfrogging over his bent form.

Felga, now sat up as straight as she could, her mouth gaped.

The guards on the walls sprinted toward the door to the receiving room as Cam raced to exit. Their weapons were drawn and raised to fire. However, when the boy reached the door, he hit the firm torso of a pale Bodach'i, standing like a wall in the door. The creatures reptilian tongue flashed, tasting the air. Cam fell back, and blasters were lined on him.

The blue Twi'lek with one hand grabbed the scruff of Cam and lifted him up like a freshly caught scalefish. The other hand covered his eye.

"You just earned a painful death, slave," the slave warden growled.

He went to walk around the Bodach'i that had entered, but the white lizard stumbled and tried to steady himself by gripping the slave warden's shoulder. The warden looked at the Bodach'i with disgust and shook the grip off. The lizard crumbled to the floor like a sack of Kessel potatoes and the warden stepped back almost dropping the boy.


	14. Episode X The Dark Hunter Arrives

"What in the-" the warden stammered. "He's drunk!"

At that moment the warden felt the sting of a midge bite on the nape of his neck. He swatted at it, but it was too late. The injected sedative took effect within seconds. Cam dropped to the ground as the warden's hand became weak, and the Twi'lek collapsed. One bite was not enough to completely anesthetize him, but he would be weakened for a few minutes. Felga and the Weequay guards looked confused, but just for a moment, for in the doorway stood a dark figure: the black-clad Videsse. Her midge droids returned to her left gauntlet and in her hand, she held one of her thermal grenades.

Six blasters aimed at her and the whinnies of their charges cut the thick silence in the room. The Weequays' thick brown skin protected them from the midges and was the only reason that they were still standing.

"Uh uh, I wouldn't do that if I were you," she warned and held up the grenade with confidence.

Cam stared at her, not knowing what to make of this new player, but trying to figure how to get around her.

The room was still for a few seconds as not just Cam but everyone tried to ascertain what action to take. Felga broke the silence. "Put the grenade away, we all know this ruse. We see it every day." She seemed to sober up surprisingly. "You aren't going to detonate that grenade."

"You don't know me," Videsse replied.

The guards fingered their triggers more tightly and leaned in for a sure shot. Cam crawled away on all fours like a monkey-lizard.

Videsse glanced between them. "Yeah, you don't know me at all," she laughed. She lowered the grenade, letting it slip off her fingers. Its hollow clank echoed in the room and then it rolled toward the guards.

To say that they lost all composure is an understatement. At once, blasters were dropped and heals were in the air, and just as Cam had made a monkey-lizard impression a second earlier, now the six guards were giving their best attempt at it.

The grenade rolled slowly half way between Felga and Videsse where it rocked to a stop. There it sat and nothing happened.

Now it was Felga's turn to laugh. "What did I tell you? You didn't activate it," she stammered between the coughing chuckles.

Videsse did not reply but held up nonchalantly a data chip.

Felga recognized the implication. This was business. "So, the red starburst on your shoulder gives away that you are an Otlell clone," Felga belched out, her laughter subsiding. She wiped her mouth again from the drool that escaped while she laughed as her demeanor changed to a more official tone. "I've done business with Otlell before, Red Sun, she liked to be called. And judging from your techniques. The midge droids and this…" Felga waved her hand at the sleeping grenade. "You are formed from the same mold as her." Felga sniggered reservedly at the clone joke as if it had just occurred to her what she had said.

"Your Ladyship," Videsse began and bowed her head. "I am familiar with Terrah Otlell," she began, veiling her true familiarity. "And forgive my arrogance, but you, filthy worm, do not speak her name in front of me. You are not worthy to breathe that name. Do it again, and, by the stars, it will be the last word you ever say." She spoke calmly, quietly, firmly, directly. The words seemed not to come from her mouth as much as they were emitted from her entire form.

Felga furrowed her brow in confusion over Videsse's reaction. The tone and warning were not lost on the drunk Hutt and sobered her a degree. Anger came over her face like a sheet. By this time the guards had regained their confidence and their blasters. However, Felga's visage of fire passed quickly from her face and receded to smolder deeper in her soul. She held up her hand to stay the guards for a moment.

"Your manners are not like hers though," Felga said with squinting eyes. "The data chip you hold. What is your business?"

"Twenty thousand for your sleeping guards in the other room. And sixty for the answer to a question," Videsse spoke calmly yet sharply. Her voice betrayed no emotion. Her facade was in place.

Felga's long mouth caved into a smile. "Eighty thousand!" She leaned forward some more. How an obese creature like her remained seated as she leaned over the way she did is a feat left explainable only to the physicists of Adana; but her hunched figure did remain on her couch, whether miracle or science, who can tell. "A question. But first. Your weapons. I do not negotiate with the armed."

Videsse nodded and lifted her arms to acquiesce the demand. Two guards sidled up carefully and removed her pistols and every grenade from her belt. She did not have her rifle with her currently. As we will see, our heroine did not need it this time, and she knew it. When they were satisfied they slid back away and behind the other four guards that held her at the end of their blasters. The Twi'lek slave warden quivered slightly as he tried to move near her feet; a slight and depressed moan came from him.

"Now," Felga said as she reclined again. "Your presence here will cost you eighty thousand. Your question, another eighty."

Videsse began. "Your Ladyship, I offer two hundred, if it pleases you."

Felga smiled at that thought. "I don't know what to make of you exactly," she slurred. "But, I am pleased with your negotiations." She nodded and waved her hand for Videsse to continue.

"Men, hooded with black faceless masks. They destroyed a shop in the merchant quarter; a shop owned by a mechanic Trandoshan. They were searching for a ship; an _SS-64_. Who were they?"

A frown materialized over Felga's face. "Oh, clone. Many shops are destroyed in the merchant quarter every day. To think that I would know the details of every incident. Your clone-prime mother, knew better than to ask me questions like this. Perhaps you are not cut from the same cloth as Terrah Otlell." She started to laugh again at the poor joke that she had made.

Cam, who had been watching intently from a corner, recognized the obvious lie of her involvement. However, he was not about to say a word, and even if he was there was not a moment to speak out. A flash cut through the air; a silver streak.

Felga's eyes widened, and her laugh was cut abruptly short. It was not the only thing that was cut. Her fat arms jerked to her throat where her thick fingers tried to move her dewlap and get to the just barely visible hilt of Videsse's vibroblade. Black blood poured down her chest and painted her fingers.

The Weequay guards in a confused moment looked to their patroness and then back to Videsse, but she was gone. Their fearful eyes darted around the room. A guard in the back, the one with Videsse's grenades, suddenly straightened up, blood pouring from his neck now. He cried out with a wet gurgling cough and fell to the ground. Blasters erupted in the room shooting at shadows. Felga fell off her couch onto the floor in front of her, her flapping mass writhing as she tried to remove the knife. A smoke grenade erupted, and for a split second the guards could just see Videsse materialize as she deactivated her cloak. She then disappeared into the cloud. They fired, red bolts half revealing a shadow in the cloud. Two of the five remaining guards fired on the staggering shadow; it collapsed. Without warning, the Weequay behind them, the one with Videsse's pistols fell to the ground, again with the same neck wound as the first. The four remaining spun around to see the wispy vapor lines of Videsse's reactivated cloak. O, how our heroine was apt at deception! For a moment they were dumbfounded. Who had they shot in the cloud? Their question was not to be answered yet as Videsse's pistol fire cut down two more of them. Then another smoke grenade erupted at their feet. Only two guards remained, and they were terrified, firing every way possible. Cam had leapt behind a pillar and stood still as he waited for an opportunity to leave, but the sporadic fire was too unpredictable.

Felga's flailing tail swept powerfully across the floor as she gasped trying to breathe. The knife was removed but her trachea now filled with blood. One of the guards, unfortunately, was brushed away with it. He fell over and then was crushed under her weight as she rolled on top of him, both of them spitting blood over the floor. The last guard, blinded by the smoke continued firing erratically through the room, trying desperately to avoid the massive Hutt in the throws of her death rales. The ground shook as Felga's heavy tail pounded the ground half a dozen times, breaking and crushing the guard underneath her before finally crashing to a halt.

When it was obvious that she was done thrashing, the remaining guard crouched by Felga for cover. She was not dead yet; her chest heaved as she tried to breathe and as fate tried to end her. He squinted through the grey smoke and tried to stay as silent as possible. The only sound that could be heard was the rattling breaths of Felga. The smoke slowly settled and the guard could see the dead slave warden not far from him on the floor. That answered the question as to whose shadow they had fired at in the cloud.

"Getting easier to see, huh?" Videsse's voice came from in front of him, just on the other side of Felga's body.

The guard's dark eyes widened and he raised his weapon to fire. Videsse's image materialized in front of him just opposite of the Hutt. Her pistol was aimed at his head, and a flash of red was the last thing he ever saw.

Videsse then leaned over the dying Felga, her breaths slowing. "I told you it would be the last thing you'd ever say," Videsse whispered.

Felga's dark eyes looked to the painted ceiling, the image of herself standing over the universe with the scales in her hand was staring back at her. Felga's spirit left her, to where I cannot tell, and with that, her vision faded.


	15. Episode X A Tidal Wave

"You killed her," Cam questioned as he angled his torso to get a peek from behind the pillar.

"Felga had gotten a little too secure in her security, bein' in power for so long," Videsse stated and continued to fix the rest of her grenades back onto her belt.

"You didn't even get an answer to your question," Cam continued.

Videsse retrieved her bloody vibroblade. "Might have gone differently if they had checked my boots for knives. But, I didn't come here to get answers." She wiped sticky black blood off on Felga's boa. "Though, it would've been nice."

Cam, seeing an opportunity ran to one of the dead Weequay's and started to remove his boots. He fell to the ground and put them on his feet, raising one leg at a time.

"You know, I'm a bounty hunter too," he said feigning superiority. "Nice job. But I would have made Felga talk," he huffed as he squeezed his foot into the first boot.

Videsse just shook her head and stood up to leave. "Whatever. She deserved what she got."

Cam, with urgency, bolted up and raced to get in front of her, not bothering to buckle the boots which were surprisingly only one size too big for him. The Weequay had small feet, and Cam, judging by his feet, was going to be tall when he was fully grown. "Wait, wait!"

Videsse did not respond, only pushed him aside and continued to walk. Cam fell to his side like a rag. He furrowed his brow and gritted his teeth, surprised at Videsse's strength. "Wait! Don't you want to know who those hooded men were?"

Videsse was almost to the door as she stepped over the Bodach'i. She halted, one leg on each side of the sleeping lizard and turned to Cam.

"What do you mean?" she asked coldly.

Cam, seeing he had her attention, at least for a second stammered. "I know who they are. They brought me here." He patted dirt off his arms and legs and again pretended arrogance.

"Okay, who are they?" Videsse followed.

Cam smiled now with a grin that could have stretched ear to ear if he was a different species. "I'm a bounty hunter, remember. I expect payment for services rendered." He crossed his arms.

Videsse put her hands on her hips. Her voice was obviously agitated and as if without saying it, her tone was communicating, "Do I really have to deal with this right now?" Instead, the words that were actually spoken were, "Fine, what do you want?"

"I need a ship-"

Videsse rolled her eyes behind her mask. "Forget it," she interrupted and started to leave.

"Uh-I meant, I want to go with you," Cam threw out as fast as he could and flew to stand in the doorway. "I want off this moon."

Videsse thought for half a second. To her, that was not much better, but she acquiesced. "Okay, who are they?"

Cam almost started to say what he knew, then stopped, his mouth half open. "I'll tell you on your ship when we are out of this system. You have a ship, right?"

Videsse shook her head again in disappointment. "You might be smarter than you look… boots. We need to get out of here, now. If you can follow me, you can come. If not, too bad."

"Sure thing!" Cam erupted and almost leapt a little in excitement. "I'll be on you like a shadow, no problem."

"Uh, boots," Videsse stated dryly.

"Yeah," Cam replied figuring she was assigning him a nickname.

"No, I mean your boots-buckle them," Videsse sighed.

Cam's eyes widened at the embarrassment and dropped to the floor, his hands scurrying over the footwear. Videsse was already out the door.

The receiving room was strewn with five more sleeping guards, one changeling snoring loudly in the corner. Another guard, a Talz, started to stir, its dark proboscis twitching as he started to awake. Videsse picked up her pace and strode through the room to the opposite closed door. Cam caught up, just getting to her as the door swept open with a gasping _skrit_.

Outside was the sprawling game room beneath. Felga's receiving room was a story above and was accessed by two stairways that curved downward to the game room floor. As soon as the door opened, a cacophony of yells, grunts, arguments, and laughter pressed into the room, and with it the sweaty humid stench of alcohol, ailments, and various bodily secretions. The game room was like a hive of sweat bees, tightly packed and incoherently crawling over each other. Some were gambling; some were consorting, some swindling; and others being swindled. Young slaves darted between them, bringing drinks and food which was greedily consumed or thrown on the floor after one taste.

Two guards crouched on the floor near Videsse, one on each side of the receiving room door. They held their heads, trying to shake the pounding headache from Videsse's thanatizine tranq-midges. Videsse positioned herself in front of one, another Bodach'i, and looked down at him.

"What are you doing!" she interrogated.

The white lizard shook his head and looked up in drugged confusion. His eyes were dilated and betrayed his simple-mindedness. Videsse lifted him up.

"Drinking on the job!" She yelled at him then turned to Cam. "Slave, pick that other worthless Bantha up."

Cam spasmed at being addressed and quickly moved to the other guard, a triangular headed Dresselian. He propped his arms under the guard and helped the staggering creature up.

Videsse closed the receiving room door and talked quickly in almost a hushed tone. "You have no idea how upset Felga is with you. Passed out instead of standing your post. Oh, I wouldn't go in there if I were you. She's already ordered her slave warden killed."

The Bodach'i straightened in fear and seemed to sober up a few degrees. He slurred some words, not understandable in any language. Videsse dusted off his shoulders and shook her head implying that she was helping a dead man. It was part of the ruse. "Right, good luck."

She left them with a purposeful and sliding stride down the stairway on her left. Any eyes that fell on her assumed she belonged without question. The guard at the bottom of the stairway, a Weequay, held out his hand inconspicuously, and she likewise slid the credit chip that contained the two hundred thousand credits into his palm. Videsse entered the crowd and slipped through like a venomous cripe fish, swimming upstream effortlessly. She siddled between patrons, and if any turned to her to give trouble, they somehow found themselves on the floor underfoot. The room was loud and chaotic enough, that no one noticed little scuffles like that. However, it was a tenuous crowd, on edge by nature, and only secure in the fact that the crimelady, Felga, even though she was corrupt like them, at least maintained order on the Smuggler's Moon. What would happen when they and the rest of the moon discovered that their only keeper-of-order had been removed? Well, I will not keep that answer from you much longer.

There was a sudden eruption of blaster fire at Felga's receiving room door above them. A blaster went off and the Bodoch'i guard dropped. The crowd abruptly stopped all their activities and looked up. The hooded Talz stood over the Bodach'i and cried out in his squeaking language that Felga had been assassinated. His black-goggled eyes scanned the crowd. The crowd gasped for a second, then murmurings and quick disputes broke out, as a good portion of the patrons started to grab at any money they could off of gambling tables, the first wave of the chaos that was coming. Every second the noise and bustling grew louder with larger and larger waves. Blaster fire cut the air, at first one or two, then three or four each second. The potential energy of the room was already dangerous, now it was starting to leak out, and the dam was about to break in a kinetic rush. Some patrons tried to rush the receiving room to see if they could plunder Felga's quarters. It was at that moment, as the Talz and two other of the waking guards, upon seeing two dozen men ascend the stairs, that they let loose a rain of blaster fire from above. The Talz, still scanning the crowd, unfortunately, spotted Videsse's black form ten meters beneath him. He screamed at the crowd communicating with his squeaking language that there was the killer at the end of his pointed finger. Those that had actually paid attention, looked to her and began to grab for their blasters.

"Sod it all!" Videsse exclaimed. She activated another smoke grenade and threw it into the crowd behind her. It burst on top of someone's head, probably killing him, and smoke plumed out in a billowing nebula. That was enough. The chaos and fear rose with the surging smoke; screams were now added to the blaster fire, and Videsse pushed her way through the crowd that was now pressing for the door.

Our heroine did not expect a riot to start so quickly, but it did. She was swept toward the large double doors of the atrium, a dam broken with the tidal wave. She tried to keep her head above the fleeing people. Her vibroblades came out and not a few unfortunate goons were cut down before her. She continued to be pressed forward out of the doors and into the pillared veranda. Videsse could feel the masses of men and creatures that were being trampled underfoot as she was pushed along. The living wave poured into the streets where the fearful and angry mass flowed down every channel, looting, burning, and trampling as it went.

The crowd expanded as it dispersed down each alleyway, and Videsse was able to get some room to breathe. She cursed herself for leaving her jetpack back on Geonosis. The boot rockets were not sufficient for sustained flight, and this was a good time to get above the crowd. However, she did manage to side-skirt into an alley that had only a few looters in it. Videsse did not take time to stop and collect herself. She just pushed past an unsuspecting man, knocking him over. His face hit the stone masoned wall, not even recognizing what had happened as his teeth cracked and Videsse flew past. She simply ran, planning on making a circuit back to Felga's rear entry, where her ship was docked.

"Where are we headed?" Cam's voice called from behind her.

Videsse took an instantaneous glance behind her, not changing her stride. "You're still here!"

"Like a shadow, I said," Cam replied full of pride.

Videsse nodded but did not reply. She was, in a slight way, impressed. It was obvious Cam would stick to her, and she did not need to waste her running breath on explaining.


	16. Episode X Escape from Nar Shaddaa

It did not take long and Videsse, with Cam close behind, found their way to the landing pad behind Felga's palace. The crowd on the streets was actively gaining strength, but that was on the other side, and only a few of Felga's goons had ventured to the landing pad.

Soon, the riot would encompass the entire moon, throwing it into anarchy. Some fleeing looters would even make it to neighboring systems and cause not-so-slight disturbances there as well. News of it would reach the Galactic Senate, and councils would be made to come up with a solution, to no avail. With the unrest in the galaxy, this would be another splash of Rhydonium fuel thrown on the fire. More systems, as a consequence, would find an excuse to secede. Our heroine had a part in that, but again, that is a story for galactic historians, and only briefly concerns us as an intriguing connection between this story to other historical accounts. However, as with my many narrative faults, you have no doubt discovered, I must again return from my digression, back to Videsse.

And we see she is already trading blaster bolts with the goons that were trying to slip away with her ship. Two were on the ground. Two more were pinning Videsse and Cam behind a Mini-Trident-class assault ship, a devilsquid-shaped starship. Do not let the name fool you, the _Mini_-class designation did not mean that it was small. It was just under half the height of the full-sized, eighty-meter Trident-class ship. Thus, compared to that, I suppose it was miniature. Its sleeping tentacle-like sublight drives were folded up onto the upright body of the conical ship.

The goon's blaster fire did not rest, keeping Videsse and Cam crouched behind the fuselage. Videsse figured rightly that another of the men would be making his way around to get to them from behind. Time was short. She looked above her at the pointed top of the ship thirty-five meters above. Getting up would not be a problem. It was getting down that she was assessing as she calculated the boost time it would take to reach the tip.

"Well, here goes nothin'" she said aloud and ignited her boot rockets with a leap. She rushed upward, gaining speed as she ascended in a sharp line. Her boot rockets heated up and flared in red-orange bladed flames. Videsse counted the seconds in her head as she approached the top, and killed the boot rockets just shy of the peak so that she arced a little short of the pointed apex. Her hands reached out and grasped the cap, pulling her body in and hugging it. She struggled to find a toehold for her feet on the steep angle and high-stepped a few strides trying to get a grip. There was a moment that she reconsidered this idea but soon found a centimeter ledge at an armored joint of the ship. She shook her head and took a deep breath, collecting herself. Once she felt some semblance of confidence in her position, she carefully let go of the pointed apex with her right arm, still firmly hugging it with her left and found her pistol. The two goons near her ship were still firing on the base of the ship not noticing that she had flown to the top, and she could see another rounding to her left. If she missed the two near the ship, she would be a sitting quadduck, and the one on the left would be a challenge being an awkward shot with her right hand. Added to that, she was not completely sure she had enough boot rocket fuel to pull off a landing without-well, she was sure a landing would be possible, just not survivable.

At this point, a question may tickle the recesses of your mind and I am aware of it, and if perhaps it does not show itself in your conscious thought, I will aid it in raising it from your subconscious by giving words to the question; you may wonder, why Videsse did not activate the droid brain on _Slave-1_ and have the ship defend itself. Certainly, _Raider_ would have easily quenched the attack. I will remind you, though, _Raider_ was an addition to the ship by her mother who, though she felt she needed to be on her own, still betrayed her inner desire to have Boba Fett by her side. So _Raider_ spoke like Boba, sounded like Boba, and sometimes acted like Boba. Videsse simply could not stand it at this time. She did not need him, and she could not deal with what the droid brain conjured within her. Like she said earlier at the grave site, she was going to do this by herself.

So that brought her to the pinnacle of a ship, thirty-five meters above the landing pad, her finger rapidly trilling a rain of red blaster fire down on the two goons, who knows what species they were from this distance. They were not injured in the fire, but not expecting an attack from above, their confidence already shaken by the earlier developments, they simply turned-tail and retreated to find another, easier opportunity.

The assailant on the left, though, was not dissuaded and began firing on the Trident's peak. This goon was a droid, black and humanoid, with a rifle aimed at Videsse. Videsse leapt back from the peak with enough force to clear the conical base of the ship. She descended rapidly, and just as rapidly retrieved her left pistol, raised it, and fired with its pair three dozen shots flying through the air like red needles as she dropped from thirty-five to ten meters in less than two seconds. She then ignited her boot rockets to slow her descent, and it did bring her to almost a complete stop about two meters above the ground before the boot rockets extinguished their cartridges. It was a hard drop from that height. She collapsed, her knees buckling under her, and her hands pounding the ground but she was not injured.

Cam's blue face looked on, his eyes wide in excitement at Videsse's feat. Videsse, of course, acted as if it was effortless and dusted off her knees. Inside, though, we may safely assume our heroine had a different thought. The droid, ten meters away, had been damaged, and apoplectically seized on the ground with two dismembered limbs lying next to it.

Videsse, not saying anything, ran for the _Slave-1_, activating the caudal ramp with a button on her left wrist controls. Cam followed close behind, his own gaze darting around every corner to the other ships as he tailed her.

They entered the ship, as the ramp began closing under them.

"What are you going to do with that kid?" Boba's voice came.

"Shut up, _Raider_, and turn yourself off," Videsse snapped. The lights of the ships console were already dark.

"Who are you talking to?" Cam commented as he looked around the cramped cargo bay.

"Nobody, you shut up, too, and strap yourself in. We're getting out of here."


	17. Episode X Boots

Cam rubbed behind his ear and leaned back against the cargo bay wall. The blue light of hyperspace rippled off the far wall and sent shimmering shadows across his already blue face. The cargo hold was adequate for this small starship, but with Videsse's anchored hovercarts, there was just enough room for two people to lie down parallel to each other. There _was_ a passenger seat, which Videsse had failed to tell Cam about. Hence, the boy rubbed his head, where he had hit it against the far wall when _Slave-1_ jumped to hyperspace.

Videsse rose from the pilot seat and angled back to where Cam was seated. She stood over him akimbo, her hands on her hips.

"Okay," she started. "We're off that moon. Now, who are those men?"

Cam looked up at her, his brown eyes squinting in thought. "Where are you taking me?"

"Headin' to the eastern expanses. There are plenty of systems there to choose from," Videsse answered. "Who are they?"

"Any nice?" Cam replied, not answering the question.

Videsse gritted her teeth. "Answer the question. I got you off that rock like you asked." She leaned over and grabbed him by his collar. "Now, who are they? Or I'll drop you off right here."

Cam swallowed hard and scrunched his face. "I, uh-." His voice trailed off and he looked at the floor sheepishly.

Videsse knew what this meant, and the silence lingered like a third person in the room. She spoke unemotionally, cooly, yet sharply, "You don't know."

Cam pursed his lips and squinted meekly as if waiting to be beaten. He could not tell what was going on behind the blue eye screens of Videsse's helmet, but he knew he was in trouble when her grip on his collar tightened and twisted, which usually meant that he was about to be thrown. His muscles tightened in preparation.

Instead, Videsse pushed him solidly back into the wall and groaned in frustration, slamming his head against the wall again. "Of course!" She threw up her hands and turned to a small cabinet on the wall, unlatched it, and removed a bottle of whiskey. With only an aggravated huff, she returned to the cockpit, threw her helmet under the pilot chair, and sat quietly for about an hour. The liquid flow of alcohol dispelled the rising heat of anger and at the same time raised the tide of her sorrow.

Cam remained silent in the cargo bay, rubbing his now reinjured welt behind his ear, and figuring it was best not to make a sound. He had seen Videsse kill without a second thought, and he was not planning on giving her any other reason to awaken that impulse. He bided his time checking a few other trinkets and credits he had swiped on the way out of Felga's palace; about three hundred credits, a handheld COM, and a small retractable six-centimeter blade, probably for cutting lines of Kessel spice. Each piece found its place in one of his vest pockets.

Videsse started to stir in the cockpit and she came to the back. With her helmet off Cam could see her face for the first time. Her hair was up as usual, tightly braided to her head, except for her chin-length bangs. She did not look at him and opened a cabinet opposite him. Her face was drawn, downcast, and seemed defeated. So it was with her whole body, defeat seemed to cover her like a blanket, and the half empty bottle of liquor loosely held in her hand did not help. Her shoulders drooped. She removed a few nutrient sticks from the supply cabinet and leaned against the supply cart across from Cam, who was mesmerized, wide-eyed and gaping at her appearance. She did not notice his eyes immediately and tossed a nutrient stick at him, which hit his chest and fell in his lap as if she had thrown it at a sleeping droid.

Cam shook his head, waking from his trance and looked down at the stick.

"That's for you, Boots. Eat," Videsse ordered. "You'll need it. I'm dropping you off at Mimban."

Cam continued to stare at her, without a word.

Videsse, now noticed his ogling and irritation came over her again. "What! Have you never seen a clone?"

Cam swallowed hard. "Uh, yeah, but you . . . are a lot. . . younger."

Videsse shook her head, "Whatever." She took a sip of the whiskey. He _was_ right. The Terrah Otlell clones were commissioned for the Second Galactic War seven years prior, and since they were in their mid-twenties when assigned, those Terrah-clones were now in their thirties.

A short and awkward silence settled on them again, then when Videsse could not stand his staring gaze any longer she burst out. "Would you look at something else!"

There was not much else to look at, but Cam tried.

"How old are you?" Cam asked when he finally mustered enough courage. "Fifteen."

"Ha," Videsse guffawed, not expecting that comment. "Yeah, four years ago." The comment surprisingly amused her, but only for half a second.

"You know, I'm fourteen," Cam lied. "Not much younger than you."

Videsse erupted in another laugh. The irritation with the boy was still there, but she found his forwardness ridiculous enough to temporarily hide her annoyance. "Eleven more like," she persisted. "Nice try. And I hope you like the swamp, 'cause that's what you're in for on Mimban." She tried to change the subject. It worked, in a way.

Cam tilted his head in thought and scratched his dry brown-haired head. "What are you doing after that?"

"Headin' back to Nar Shaddaa to get a _real_ lead," she said with all the acidic temper she could spit.

"That's not gonna do you any good," Cam said matter-of-factly and folded his arms. "Probably shouldn't've killed Felga." He regretted it as soon as he said it. "Uh, I mean-but- she probably wasn't gonna tell you anything anyway," he sputtered.

Videsse did not reply. She looked deep in thought. The awkward presence of silence returned for five more minutes.

This time Cam broke it, "You should take me to Takodana. We can find better leads there."

Videsse furrowed her brow and looked at him incredulously. "What are you talking about?" She was sure to make Cam know how nonsensical he was with her tone.

"That's where those guys came from," Cam said as if it was obvious. "They were looking for some saber weapon there and didn't find it, then came to Nar Shaddaa looking for a ship instead. And have you seen the leader's saber weapon?" He took his first bite of the nutrient stick.

Now Videsse returned a gaping stare in his direction, her eyes wide and jaw dropped. "You said you didn't know who they were."

"Yeah, I don't know who they are," he agreed. "But they did talk a lot."

Videsse shook her head. "Boots, I don't know how someone hasn't killed you yet. I've been around you for only two hours and I've already thought of it a dozen times." She turned and bent over to move to the forward cockpit, sliding into the pilot's chair. "_I'm_ gonna get leads at Takodana." She emphasized _I'm_. "_You're_ gonna do whatever. Quit the 'we' talk. You're on your own at Takodana."

"You never know. Maybe you need a thief like me…" Cam said, stopping short when he realized he did not know how to address her. "What do I call you?"

"Nothin'. 'Cause you'll be on your own as soon as we arrive. And for your information, I work alone. And I especially don't need a boot thief."

Cam smiled a satisfied grin. He was not going to be dropped off on Mimban. "_We'll_ see," Cam replied under his breath. Whether Videsse heard it or not, I will leave that up to you to decide.

Videsse, however, did make one comment of her own under her breath. "I don't need anyone."

Oh, Videsse, how you assume to know what will make you happy; the hopeless remedies that you try to cure your soul with; the hopeless remedies we all search for. If only, Videsse, you knew, as I do, and as those hearing your story also are coming to understand, what it is that that will heal you. How you are searching for an impotent cure and trying to abandon the very thing that would remedy your ailing heart. Alas, if only I could tell you. If only you would hear. If only we all could hear.


	18. Episode X Maz's Watering Hole

Takodana was a medium sized green planet of the Mid Rim, and was populated by less than a million inhabitants; not many for its size. It's lush forests and temperate climate were attractive to some naturalists and misanthropes, yet sitting on the edge of the more populous core systems it did not have the conveniences other planets had, so most ignored it. However, the planet was a welcomed escape from the political unrest in the galaxy, and some emigrated to Takodana in protest of galactic oversight. The influx was not as big as it would soon be, but currently, a handful of secessionists had founded secret communities in the planet's arboreal hills. There they could hide from galactic sovereignty and live under their own rule and order. It was a place that, for the time being, was safe for these communities.

Videsse and Cam found themselves on the doorstep of ramshackle watering hole nestled in these hills, after a short stop in Andui, the planet's only and _meager_ city. It seemed that any questions about anything secretive or suspicious produced reluctant and borderline taciturn responses pointing to this watering hole. Videsse, having tried to lose Cam, found it an impossible task, Cam being a virtuoso on shadowing. Finally, she unenthusiastically assented to him tagging along only while she was grounded.

Why did he insist on remaining with her? His reply to her was that he was a bounty hunter needing work, and hanging out with her was a good way to find a client. At least as ridiculous as it was, that is what he said his reason was.

The watering hole was erected over ancient ruins, large rock slabs and rubble were strewn about from a destroyed castle, creeping vines covering most of them with a lace shawl. There was a narrow, yet well-worn path winding through what was left of previously towering walls, now roofless and jagged. The watering hole itself was newly constructed, perhaps only a few years old, which could be seen in its patchy white plastocrete walls. The moist and cool climate had not yet stained the entire surface with its dark green mold.

The building was longer than it was wide, with no second floor. Parts of the exterior walls were built around existing rock slabs left over from the ruins; a destroyed castle rebuilt and not even a shadow of what it once was. It was a patchwork shack built on top of glory, diffidence raised over dignity. However, that architecture spoke nothing of the kind of patrons the watering hole attracted, who were neither diffident nor dignified. Although this was not the same type of rabble, we had seen on Nar Shaddaa, even if in appearance they looked similar.

Yet, here again, I get ahead of myself, almost taking you inside while our heroine is still outside the front door, and already in a heated discussion with the guard, as if that was surprising.

The door was a manually-latched heavy wooden door, with a metal slide bar to lock it. One guard stood in front; an oversized Besalisk, large even for his species as he completely obscured the door from Videsse's view. Two of the Besalisk's arms were folded across his chest, his second right arm was on his holster, and the remaining arm was outstretched, keeping Videsse from charging the door.

"What do you mean, no helmets allowed," Videsse protested loudly. A line of various helmets fringed the wall on either side. "I've never heard anything so stupid!" She tried to swipe his large forearm off her shoulder, as effectively as if she tried to swipe down a decade old uneti tree.

"Don't like it, don't come in," the Besalisk guard growled back at her. "Maz's new orders." He pushed her back a step.

"You're tellin' me I can bring these in." Videsse waved her hands, featuring her sidearms and explosive charges. "But I can't bring in this." She leaned forward and pointed to her helmet.

The Besalisk nodded. "That's right."

Videsse shook her head and looked at the ground, thinking for a moment. "Fine!" The reply was loud and bitter and sharp with outrage.

She removed the helmet and threw it down with the others. Her lips were pursed and eyes squinted in disapprobation. "Happy?"

The Besalisk made another nod and stepped aside, waving his arm in a preposterously regal way.

Videss huffed and went in, Cam sidling and entering with her.

Now, as I had alluded to earlier, the patrons, although they looked not unlike the vile creatures that lived on Nar Shaddaa, they were of a different nature. They were rough and dangerous, yet not for their own greedy desires, rather for their own political designs. If they were criminals, they were so as a protest, and not as a profession.

Videsse scanned the room. It was not crowded, only having three dozen patrons at most, and four stewards of the establishment, one being a Kowakian monkey-lizard that ran the bar. By the look of it, Videsse figured half the liquor was lost by the monkey-lizard on the floor, on the bar, on the wall, and on the outside of each glass. Videsse continued her survey. The place attracted an eclectic crowd. There were a handful of non-specific humanoids of different colors, similar but still not like Cam. In the distant corner by the bar, sat a darkly clad man with a somewhat unattractive visage, not helped by his feeble beard. He glanced at the newcomers nonchalantly. A few Rhodians occupied a table; at others an amphibious Ishi Tib, some Jawas, a snake-like Sluissi, and . . . Videsse's eyes stopped on two humans seated along the wall to her right. The one facing Videsse met her eyes. It was a Terrah-clone; short pixie-like hair, with three dotted tattoos on her right cheek. The clone spoke something to the one sitting with her, but it could not be heard. The second, also a clone with a long braid almost extending to her waist, turned and eyed Videsse. They were in their early thirties which was consistent with the Second Galactic War commission. Both were an image of what Terrah was, and what Videsse would become. Although a clone's hair was often different, and tattoos could partially change a clone's appearance, the emerald eyes were always the same; Videsse's eyes, her mother's eyes.

Videsse rolled those very same green eyes in frustration recognizing what they were. "Great!" she commented to herself, "Just what I need right now." She knew what was coming.

Videsse found the nearest empty table and sat down turning her back from the clones and trying to see if she could determine who the proprietor of the establishment was quickly before the clones came over. She rested her elbow on the splintered wooden table and her chin on her hand.

Cam hopped onto a chair immediately next to her. "Alright." He rubbed his hands with excited anticipation. "Time to get leads . . . and a drink." He grabbed a wooden peg game that rested on the table and then looked up or rather down at a steward that had just arrived. It was a short and furry rodent-like Tynnan. "That's quick," Cam exclaimed.

Videsse shook her head and rolled her eyes again, then gave her attention to the steward.

"What's your death?" the Tynnan chipped.

Videsse produced a cockeyed gaze, "Excuse me?"

"Drink," the Tynnan stated in a frustrated tone. "What do you drink?"

"A double Cheedoan," she answered.

"Me, too!" Cam chimed in, not knowing what he was ordering.

The Tynnan chattered his teeth, suspicious of the child's request and looked at Videsse.

"Don't look at me. I ain't with him," she said matter-of-factly. "And I ain't payin' for him." She put a credit chip on the table for her own.

Cam, in turn, put a matching chip on the table next to hers. "Yeah, and there's more where that came from. A double, same as her." His grin was enormous and full of pride as he gave a sidelong look at Videsse.

The Tynnan saluted, used to letting others deal with their own issues. He simply swiped up the credits and scurried off.

Videsse squinted at Cam and raised her hands in a questioning posture. "Where did you get the credits?"

Cam wiggled his fingers as if displaying a secret. "I am a thief," he said in a low tone. "Obviously."

"In here? Already?"

"Maybe." He looked to the front door and nodded as if to indicate the Besalisk outside.

Videsse huffed and shook her head. "You need to quit that right now."

"What? Are you worried I'm going to make trouble for myself?" Cam retorted, baiting her.

"No," she answered and leaned in close to him so he could almost feel her breath on his face. She grabbed his ear. "I'm worried you're gonna cause trouble for me!"

The drinks arrived, with four hollow knocks as the shot glasses landed on the ligneous table. Videsse nodded in affirmation toward the Tynnan and then threw the first shot back, her second shot already in her other hand.

"I'm gonna need these," she said to herself.

"Sister," one of the clones spoke from directly behind her. "I didn't know they were still commissioning our line." The voice was friendly and inviting.

Videsse finished the other shot, grabbed both of Cam's and finished his as well to which Cam revolted with an emphatic, "Hey!"

"You're too young anyway," Videsse commented hypocritically. "Here we go," she continued and turned around offering a false smile that anyone with half of a wit could recognize.

Both clones had come over and stood side by side with a demeanor of open reception. They smiled, their eyebrows raised, shoulders relaxed, and a well-balanced posture. The one with short hair rested her forearm on the other's shoulder.

"We noticed you come in, sister. Can't remember when we saw one of us so young," the pixie one said. "The cloners are still making our line, I guess. You on leave?"

Videsse waved down the Tynnan and held up two fingers calling for another double. "I ain't on leave," she stated unemotionally. "And I ain't your sister."

The two looked at each other confused. Then the second spoke. "You must be dissenting then?" she countered, ignoring the sister statement. "Us too. You found the right place for the Sisterhood." It is what the Terrah-clone dissenters referred to themselves as. "We're through with the political-"

Videsse shook her head in frustration and interrupted. "I ain't dissenting, and I am definitely not one of you. And what _I'm _through with is you two, so go back to your table, and talk about how much you hate the galaxy and how happy you are to be in your clone sisterhood." She offered them a backhanded dismissal.

Cam could see the escalation coming, and having witnessed Videsse's actions in Felga's throne room, slinked to the far side of the table and lowered himself out of sight.

The hospitable demeanor that the clones shared melted, replaced with their war-hardened masks, another feature of Terrah that was persistent among every one of her clones, the mask.

"Enough with her, Dot," the long-haired clone said to the other. "This one here is a _Nier_." It was slang for "Denier" and used for clones that abandoned their clone affiliation. She huffed and turned away. The other followed in turn.

There was not an element within Videsse that would allow the comment to slide. Her hands clenched, her brow furrowed, she bit her lip, jolted out of her seat, straightened her back and burst out, "Call me that again!" It was an overreaction, but it was not actually these two clones that Videsse was angry with. Often a small situation attaches itself to the pain of a larger one from our past, and so it was with Videsse at this moment.

Every eye in the watering hole directed its aim on them. A clone dispute was not something one saw very often. Most though lowered themselves or sidestepped to the door in case a chance blaster bolt came about, which was likely since Videsse's right hand was on her pistol. A patron at the table behind Videsse scurried away to the corner.

The two clones parted from each other, making a large gap between them, and preparing for a confrontation. Their hands hung at their sides and were careful not to move for their own weapons.

"You don't want to throw down with us, kid," Dot spoke. "A warning."

These women spoke Videsse's language when they gave a warning, and in a peculiar way, Videsse found comfort in that. However, the air was still tense. She did not draw, but she did not remove her hand from the pistol. A few seconds passed which felt like minutes.

"Dot, Spark," another voice came from a few meters to the left of Videsse. "Let this one go, I have business with her."

They did not remove their cautious stare from Videsse. "You have business with this one, Maz? Really?" Spark questioned.

The small-statured humanoid, with large ocular lenses, stepped forward. "I do, though she doesn't know what kind yet." She moved in between the clones and Videsse. "You are looking for me," Maz Kanata, the proprietor of the establishment, stated to Videsse. Her wrinkled face was stern, yet calm; an immovable wall between them.


	19. Episode X A Conversation Over Drinks

Videsse's anger plateaued. She stretched her fingers over her pistol as she still contemplated drawing it. She could hear what Boba would have advised, "There's no profit in this fight, Patch." Her mother would say, "Too, risky. Let it go."

Maz tilted her head, waiting, and it seemed, listening to a barely inaudible whisper. Another few stretched seconds passed.

Videsse's hand evenly left the pistol and found her hip.

"Fine," she assented without turning her head. "You must be the Maz that made that ridiculous rule about helmets." Videsse backstepped to her seat and sat down, not moving her direction from the clones until it was evident that they were returning to their table.

Maz took a seat across from her. Cam returned to the splintered table, the peg game in hand. The patron, a Sullustan, that had run to the corner also returned cautiously to the table behind them and reluctantly reestablished the worship of his cup. Dull chatter returned to the room as well. It seemed everything returned.

"Maz Kanata, the owner of this honorable establishment," Maz introduced herself. "Helmets and masks? Yes, well, it is a necessary rule after an incident a few weeks ago. Anonymity is no longer protected here."

Videsse thought for a moment about the comment, but Cam burst out before she could adequately process what Maz had said.

"Men in dark robes with blank masks?" Cam questioned.

Maz's magnified eyes widened producing an almost cartoonish appearance. "Yes, child."

"Yeah, they stole her ship. And they-Ow!"

Videsse kicked him under the table.

"What'ya do that for?"

Maz looked at Videsse with maternal equanimity. "So, what is it that you would allow to be revealed then?" Maz waited patiently, letting Videsse choose her words.

Videsse interpreted Maz's body language to mean that Videsse had gained an upper-hand. She leaned back against the chair and crossed her legs. "Who are they?"

"I assure you I don't know. Remember the helmet rule," Maz answered pointing to her head. "Their faces were covered."

"What were they here for?"

"Don't know that either, exactly." Maz leaned in and folded her hands. "They came here and shot a few of our patrons. For that, I am very displeased. Then they ransacked the place searching for . . . something. No questions asked."

"They were looking for a saber weapon," Cam jumped in. "Ow!"

Videsse had punched him in the shoulder. "Would you just shut up?"

Maz's face opened in wonder and smiled at the child. "You know, this child is helping you more than you know. I'd not chastise him for it."

Maz looked down and thought for a moment, then seemed to have concluded something. She turned and waved to the unattractive man in the corner. He noticed, let his unfinished drink come to rest on the table, stood up, and advanced toward them. The man came to a final stop at Maz's left elbow and looked at her with a questioning demeanor.

"Ben," she said. "Please show these two _your_ lightsaber."

Ben was obviously shocked at the request and did not attempt to produce it, his eyes continuing to question Maz without words.

"There is a reason, Master Solo. Trust this," Maz coaxed him.

"Solo?" Videsse commented.

Maz looked at her. "You know of him?"

Videsse nodded. "Yeah, stories." That was all she would say.

Ben silently took a heavy breath through his nose and removed a black hilt from his right side. He held it out and lit it for the whole room to see. Its blade glowed yellow and lit the room, producing shifting shadows on the wall and glints on the eyes of every patron that suddenly turned and gawked at it. This was the blade Ben Solo had made after his withdrawal from the First Order. Yes, you have heard the histories of the Second Galactic War. This was the same Ben Solo that had brought fear to the galaxy as Kylo Ren, the First Captain of the First Order. His fall from power and his abandonment of the First Order is detailed elsewhere. However, it is relevant for you to know that he fought with the Supreme Leader and in that battle, he lost his connection to the magical power many call the Force. In that way, he was very much like Maz Kanata, who also had lost that power when she had fought the same being a thousand years earlier.

Ben held the blade still, not waving it, and not caring to do so. His face was unemotional and disinterested in Videsse or Cam. It seemed there was not much in life that could interest the man. He was a shell of someone; someone that may have had been great, but now he was an empty man; a man that had lost much, but still remained; a hollow man, with no drive, no purpose, no reason, not pretending, but not real either.

"This is a lightsaber," Maz informed them. "You have seen one before?"

Videsse could not take her gaze from it. "Yes, a few."

"The men had one, a red one like a cross," Cam interjected. Videsse allowed it this time.

That information had an obvious effect on both Maz and Ben. The lightsaber extinguished and Ben threw a sharp gaze at Maz, whose whole face seemed to widen in surprise.

"Now, _that_ is interesting," Maz said, her voice raised. "And that was the blade they were looking for?"

"No," Cam answered. "They were looking for another one, but said they didn't find it."

Maz looked again to Ben. They seemed to share another entire conversation without words in one second except no movement of any facial muscle signified it.

"Even more interesting," Maz said, without turning from Ben.

"What?" Videsse asked. "You know who they are. Don't tell me you don't."

Maz turned her head to Videsse. "Now, I have a suspicion. Acolytes. Worshipers of the dark side. Likely, that is who these men are."

"Religious fanatics?" Videsse asked as if it were ridiculous.

"Yes, and they are looking for certain . . . artifacts, I suppose. They have done it before," Maz continued. "And the child said they stole your ship." She thought for another second and scratched her chin. "Do you know who owned your ship before you?"

"Yeah, some Sith Lady of the First Order during the last war," Videsse answered.

"Irata," Ben spoke for the first time. His voice was deep and heavy. He pivoted away from them, hiding his face and rubbing his temples. He exhaled heavily through gritted teeth.

"Why? What is important about that?" Videsse questioned, intrigued.

"I'm sorry child, but I don't know why they want these things," Maz answered diverting Videsse's question from a conversation about the Sith Lady. "I'm afraid I do not have the answer. There are many Acolyte sects across the galaxy."

"I killed two of them. They had nothing on them to tell where they came from," Videsse was becoming more comfortable giving information since it was producing moderate results.

"Did you unmask them?" Maz asked. "What did they look like?"

"Orange skin, white pupilless eyes, white hair, both of them. Never saw anyone like them."

"Arkanians, the diamond miners," Ben interjected. He had returned to the conversation after having composed himself. "Makes sense."

Maz nodded. "Arkanians don't mix well with others," she stated. "They think of themselves as a superior race. That's why you've never seen them. Not many have. Those Acolytes would be an Arkanian sect exclusively."

"Arkania. Got it," Videsse quipped, knowing now where she was headed. She had seen the system on her galactic maps.

The Tynnan brought Videsse's two shots to the table, drips of whiskey trailed down the sides, leaving a slightly yellow line on the outside of each white shot glass. Videsse moved to grab them with both hands, but before she knew it, Maz's hands were on top of hers.

"You don't need this, Patch," she said in a motherly way.

Videsse froze, not able to comprehend completely what Maz said, but what she did comprehend chilled her soul enough to leave her motionless and dumbfounded. "How. . ." She broke off her comment, her diaphragm spasming in shock. Her hands did not move from the shots and her fingers quivered. More drops of liquor escaped from the rim of the brimmed glasses. "Boots," she commented coldly. "Leave. We are done, now."

Cam furrowed his brow and shook his head. "What do you mean? We're going?"

"No, _you_ get out. You and I. We're done. I brought you here. Now, you're on your own," Videsse's eyes did not move from Maz as if she could bore a hole in her with her gaze.

Cam understood, his face dropped, and he fingered the pegs on the game. "Fine," he said morosely. "But you owe me these," he burst out as he darted for the drinks and grabbed Videsse's wrists.

Videsse recoiled. Maz likewise. The drinks spilled-it had always been their fated destiny. Amber liquor rippled over the pitted wood. Cam gripped Videsse's wrist and mashed the buttons on her console. Midge droids took flight with high pitched whines. Cam was swiped off his chair; his body jarred as his posterior bounced on the stone cobbled floor. The Sullustan behind them swatted the back of his neck. Videsse pressed her wrist console and the droids hummed back to her wrist.

"Boots!" Videsse stood up and yelled. "Get out of here!"

Cam rolled off his back and onto his feet. "Fine." His blue face was sad, but there was a hint of a very slight smile on the right corner of his mouth. "I'm gone."

The Sullustan patron tottered behind them, his hand wiping the top of his head. Cam stepped back to avoid his falling body, then stepped over the top of the sedated patron and slinked out the front door, not bothering to glance back.

When Videsse was satisfied that Cam was adequately gone, she returned her attention to Maz. "Where did you hear that name?"

Maz produced a coy smile and removed her ocular lenses. They flared out to her temples and rested like glass wings on either side of her head. The image was no less cartoonish than when she had them on. "It is sometimes haunting what you can hear if you would simply listen."

"You knew Boba Fett," Videsse accused. "How else could you know that name?"

Maz nodded as if she knew more than Videsse could comprehend. The condescension infuriated Videsse, yet she restrained it enough to seem only peeved.

"Each of our lives are lines through time and space, child. Lines that sometimes intersect, sometimes never meet, and sometimes run parallel to each other. It is the great tapestry of the galaxy. Our lines intersect at this point. That young child and yours run parallel for a span. And others . . . Your mother and father, have never been that far from you. And still, they are much nearer than you know."

Videsse rolled her eyes. "Okay, we're done here." She stood up and huffed at Maz, "I don't have a father if that ain't obvious." Videsse waved her hand as if presenting her clone face for the first time. "And I don't need the philosophy lesson."

Videsse stood up, pulled a handful of credits from her belt pouch, and after finding a twenty chip threw it on the table in a disingenuously calm manner, though every nerve was reined back, holding back an outburst.

"That's for the lead, and . . . the fortune-telling," Videsse said, her voice laced with acidic sarcasm. "I ain't payin' for the spilled whiskey."

Maz nodded, and slowly blinked her eyes as if to salute a farewell.

Videsse's boots seemed to make a louder echo off the plastocrete walls than when she had first arrived, and in a moment she had disappeared through the door, just as Cam had done moments earlier.

The Tynnan materialized with a stained, hole-ridden rag to wipe off the table. Maz slid the twenty chip to him.

"That clone wanted to buy Dot and Spark another round of what they were drinking," Maz informed. "And let them know she apologized for her rude behavior."

Ben sniggered and crossed his arms. "A wasted sentiment."

"That woman is going to need all the friends she can get," Maz replied with a half-smile.

"She is a timed detonator," Ben stated in disgust.

Maz chuckled to herself at the thought. "Funny _you_ should say that."

Again, Maz did not need to say anymore, yet Ben caught the unspoken meaning and looked down sheepishly.

"Still," Maz continued. "There is something about her. Something . . ." Her voice trailed off and she closed her eyes in thought.

"You think she can sense the Force," Ben said; a statement, not a question.

"No," Maz countered. "No, I don't think so. That is not it . . . maybe, I was just thinking she was more like us than . . . Oh, never mind the wandering thoughts of an old maid." She laughed and waved her hand as if brushing smoke away.

"They have Rey's old ship-I mean, Darth Irata's old ship," Ben changed the subject and sat down where Videsse had previously sat.

"And your old lightsaber," Maz added.

"Hmm," Ben said.

"Something's coming." Maz was concerned but not anxious. "There is an upswell across the galaxy, and a crest is almost upon us."

"Do you think we should tell Rey and the rest of the Jedi Council?" Ben massaged his forehead as if the thought was odious to him.

"No. No, they wouldn't believe us _Force-Voids_. They will question every suspicion we have, blaming our disconnect with the Force," Maz concluded. "Besides, they are too busy making the same mistake that the last Jedi Council made: confusing balance in the Force with political balance. Let them spin their wheels in politics. We'll keep an eye on this." She folded her hands, leaned in and rested her chin on her knuckles. "Ben, I want you to follow that woman."

Ben guffawed, thinking it was a joke. However, his loud laugh abruptly stopped when he saw Maz's serious gaze fastened on him. There was no humor in her face; no upturned lip, eye or wrinkle.  
"That woman, whatever her name really is, will lead you to Rey's ship," Maz said with a grave demeanor.

"You think?" Ben protested.

"She is a lot more like you than you think. She is a hunter, and what she searches for she will find." She stood up from the table. "And perhaps, she may even find something else neither of you are looking for."

Ben stood and slicked his sleeves down. "I guess I should get my A-wing prepped for a long flight." The words were hollow and hopeless. He turned to leave but Maz caught his wrist.

"Remember Ben, keep listening."

Ben nodded with a weak smile as if he knew what she meant; as if he had heard it a thousand times and it ceased to mean anything to him anymore. He then walked toward the rear of the bar and vanished in its shadow.


	20. Episode X A Memory

Videsse lowered _Slave-1_'s caudal ramp. Steam vents exhaled and puffed billows of smoke to each side, which lingered in Takodana's cool humid environment like a billowed sheet that fell and veiled the ground, not vanishing away, but rather spreading thinner and thinner. Videsse cut through it, disrupting the smooth veil into miniature cyclones, each with their own well-defined center eye. She ascended the ramp and closed it, another steam eruption reinvigorating the dispersing fog.

_Slave-1 _was quiet and lifeless, lying, as was normal, on its broad flat stern so that the cockpit faced upward. Dust particles, the only moving element, glided in the light that came through the cockpit window above. Videsse's dark form climbed the laddered floor up to the pilot's seat, where another bottle rested. She lifted the bottle and watched the contents undulated as she rocked it, and then tilted herself into the pilot's seat, lying back and facing the open starship canopy, the light blue sky of Takodana's late afternoon shining on her. She rested the whiskey bottle on her chest and removed her helmet, placing it under her seat, then fell back to look at the clear sky again. She closed her eyes and tried to remember something; something distant. The ship slept in a torpor while Videsse took a few slow breaths. She wiped something from her cheek.

"Intersecting lines," Videsse whispered. "What a joke." She could not understand why Maz's comment bothered her, or rather, she would not allow herself to _consider_ why the comment bothered her. She went to uncork the whiskey bottle but stopped. "I don't need this," she muttered, not admitting to herself that they were Maz's words. "I don't need anything." It was the same sentiment she had believed about herself previously, only now, instead of _anybody_, she expanded it to _anything_. It was a lie, as you know, but for the moment, it did her some good. The bottle found a place beneath her seat, a sufficient partner for her helmet.

Videsse inspired another few deep breaths, then she kicked the console with her left foot hitting the ignition. The flight panel came to life with an electronic hum, and along with it, _Raider_, the droid-brain mimic of Boba Fett.

"You going to turn me off again," _Raider_ began. "You aren't hard to predict."

Videsse ignored the comment, strapped the safety straps on, and gripped the control arm, raising the ship, aiming for the blue sky, and kicking the engines into full activation for exit velocity.

"Shut up, _Raider_, and calculate a path for lightspeed to Arkania," Videsse ordered.

"As you wish," the droid brain replied. Could it have been sarcasm? Could a droid brain be capable of such a thing? Still, the calculations were made.

The cerulean atmosphere faded into the black star-studded cosmos as the ship escaped the Takodana atmosphere; a moment later, the same studded stars transformed into white streaks, and then into the nebulous blue undulations of hyperspace.

Videsse crossed her arms. "Why did you do it?"

"What?" _Raider_ replied from the console speakers.

"Why did you make me like you before you left?" Videsse asked.

"Dess, I ain't Boba Fett," _Raider_'s voice replied, the poor grammar making the already Boba-like voice seem even more similar.

Videsse, as usual, ignored the comment since it did not follow her direction for the conversation. "You had no right. No right! I would have been fine if you just stayed drunk and distant. Then, it wouldn't have mattered. Mom wouldn't have come back. Life wouldn't have… I would have been fine. Better off, even. But now-" She closed her eyes and covered her face with her hands.

If a memory had come to her, the memory that she was attempting to remember, it would have been a memory of an eleven-year-old girl.

Her hand was on the control arm of the hover plow, the lurching plow jolting her feeble arms. Boba's hand came to rest on top of hers, giving her strength to stabilize the machine.

"Always keep the tension up," he instructed from the seat next to her. "You drive the plow, don't let it drive you."

The young girl bit her lip and tensed her arm and shoulder. The plow shook as the air blade cut through the dry and cracked earth, yellow waves of sand flowing past her.

"That's it," Boba replied, leaning back. "Now keep a straight line for twenty more meters."

The novice furrowed her brow and concentrated, frustrated with her ability and with Boba's expectation. "This is a waste. When are we gonna go on a hunt?"

Boba nodded. "When we need to find something. 'Til then, fifteen more meters." His hand covered hers again to give her his strength. This was something new. It was when the harvesting began, and Boba's bounty hunts ceased. His drinking ended, and his presence grew. It marked the beginning of a changed life; a life altered because of the rescuing of an eleven-year-old girl from the Keeper.

The memory, if she was remembering it, would have ended there.

Videsse kicked the console again, the dull metallic thud ringing in the cramped ship. "You had no right!" Her fists crashed onto the armrests. "Why did you do it!"

Did _Raider_ actually make an aggravated exhale? Had Terrah actually programed the droid to mimic that humanism? "What do you want me to say?" _Raider_ replied. "'Cause, I ain't going to say it."

Videsse's fiery anger spread like a wildfire over her face. "I want you to say you're sorry! Sorry, that you made me feel like I had a father!" Her voice choked and she pretended to cough to hide the pain in her throat. What she had said was enough, and somehow, it satisfied a younger version of Videsse inside, a child that sought a voice; as if the eleven-year-old had found an advocate in her nineteen-year-old self. One could even picture the two in her mind, an angry and despairing child with clenched fists standing alone on an orange deserted wasteland, a blowing sandstorm penetrating her hair and eyes and mouth. She would be crying with spasmodic coughs when an older sister stepped out of the storm and put an arm around her, the punctuated sobs of this child's storm becoming less frequent. Calm breaths would return like a gentle breeze.

None of this could be seen, if you simply looked at Videsse, only imagined, and assumed. It's truth would simply be speculative.

_Raider_ did not reply for a few seconds, waiting to see if Videsse had finished her diatribe. When it was evident that she was finished, he broke the silence.

"Now, if you're done, I'm shutting off. And have fun with that stow-away." The droid brain shut down and with an electic crack there was silence.

Videsse straightened up in confusion. "Stow-away? What do you mean?"

There was no answer. _Raider_ was gone.

Videsse erupted in an aggravated growl after a second thought. She leapt from the cockpit and to the rear vestibule where her supply cabinets were. She pulled down one of the passenger seats that folded into the wall on either side of the caudal ramp and fell upon it, crossing her legs. She stared at the supply cabinet where she stored her rations. Her heart churned within her chest as another set of words that Maz had said came to her mind- "This child is helping you more than you know." Somehow, the inner workings of her forebrain overpowered another storm in her heart.

"Boots, you can come out now. I know you're in there," Videsse commanded.

Nothing moved or stirred; no sound, no bump.

"Come on, stop wasting my time," Videsse said with a groan.

A moment of silence passed again; then a sliding sound, like an arm moving to the inside latch of the cabinet. A click followed and the door opened slowly, and even more slowly the sheepish blue face of the stow-away appeared.

"You gonna kill me?" The voice was almost a whisper.


	21. Episode X Rook Na

"How'd ya get in here?" Videsse asked dryly. She crossed her arms.

"Your wrist console," Cam replied. "When I went for the drinks, I made sure to hit the ramp button."

Videsse tilted her head at the ingenuity. Her face softened for a moment as she thought of herself when she was his age. It was something she would have done.

Cam removed himself completely, half stumbled when his lagging foot was caught on the edge of the cabinet. He then quickly stood before her, his hands by his side and his head up. He held the pegboard game in his right hand.

Videsse thought for a moment. No threats of dropping him off on another planet would keep him away, or get rid of him. For the time being, she could not lose this kid. No questioning would produce the reason he kept following her; he would not tell the truth of that, though she could guess. Videsse concluded that perhaps for a short time, their lines would run parallel. To tell how that idea frustrated her would be a detour too long to invest and costly to detail: How she hated the idea that this may appear as if she was associated with someone, how the boy frustrated her, and yet paradoxically amused her, and how even _that_ frustrated her more, how she hated that the witch-woman's words were proven true for the moment, how she believed this child would ruin her plans to find her ship, and most importantly, how she simply wanted to be alone. As always, I will not waste your time listing all those reasons.

Videsse noticed what Cam was holding. "What's that?"

Cam almost lurched, not expecting the question. "Uh, a game." He held it up. "Rook Na. Ever play it?"

"No," Videsse answered. "I've never played any games."

Cam squinted his eyes in disbelief. "What? Not ever one?"

"You stole that from Takodana," Videsse said, uncrossed her arms, and leaned forward, her elbows on her knees. "You're gonna have to stop that. Only steal when we need it." She huffed in frustration that she had to say this. It was an admission that they were going to be together for a while. "Or one of these times, you'll get yourself in a fix. You'll get me in a fix, I mean."

"Sure, only steal when needed," Cam assented so quickly as to show the little thought he invested in his ability to keep the promise.

Videsse cupped her face in her hands and took a heavy breath. "Well, we're going through the core of the galaxy, so hyperspace traffic is gonna slow things down. We've got a full day of hyperspace travel. What'll we do with it?" It was meant to be a forlorn and rhetorical question.

"I can teach you Rook Na," Cam said and dropped to the floor, crossing his feet.

"For a day?" Videsse shook her head.

"At least for an hour of it."

There was an uncomfortable silence for more than a minute before Videsse assented. "Fine." She removed herself from the seat, which sprang back into the wall with a snap and a click. She then sat opposite Cam and crossed her legs as well, mirroring him unintentionally.

"So, how does this go?" Videsse meant more than one thing with this question.

"Okay," Cam straightened up as if he was about to give a lecture for a class. "The goal is to move as many of your pegs from one side to the other as fast as you can. Get all of them there first you get two points, and each peg that survives is a point. You're the red ones. . . Here . . . Yup, like that, they all go in the holes on your side. And these white ones are mine. And this black one is the Rook Na."

"Rook Na?" Videsse asked.

"Yeah, don't you know what that is? It's a creature of the wild space. No one has ever seen it or lived to tell of it. It has eight eyes, and hundreds of teeth, and six legs, and fur, and scales, and smells blood, 'cause that's what it eats, and no one knows if it really exists, 'cause anyone that sees it, dies. People just, disappear in the jungles."

Videsse nodded. "You forgot that it can't be harmed by blasters and hunts in the dark."

"You've heard of it then," Cam said.

"Yeah, I've heard it," Videsse stated. Cam did not catch the subtle grammar of her response. Nor did he recognize that Videsse could just as likely have said "hurt" instead of "heard," her pronunciation of these two words in Basic was almost the same. Either way, Cam was oblivious to both of these nuances, so Videsse continued, "What does the Rook Na peg do?"

"It eats you. But before that, it starts in this center hole. Then I move my peg one space toward your side, like this. And then I get to move the Rook Na once. Now it's your turn."

Videsse moved one of her pegs.

"Now, the Rook Na," Cam instructed. "You move it on your turn, too. Then I go, and if ever the Rook Na comes next to my peg, you can jump it and my peg dies. And your own pegs can jump each other, but they don't die. But you can't jump like this . . . when there are two you're blocked. Yup, that's it . . . Now I can jump you with mine and nothing happens . . . but then I move the Rook Na, and . . . you're dead. Don't look at me like that. It was a fair move . . . your turn. Nice."

The pegs moved across the board in opposite directions, both players concentrating on the potential outcomes.

"So," Cam said, leading into small talk. "It's got to be nice to be a clone."

Videsse shook her head. "What makes you say that? Sod it all, Boots! Did you have to take that peg, too."

"Yup . . . I mean, being a clone, there are a whole lot of you out there. You have a people, you know . . . Nice move. But still can't get me with the Rook Na . . . I want to be a clone prime someday, and have a million of me out there."

"No you wouldn't," Videsse said. "The procedure would kill you."

"What?" Cam questioned as if it was absurd.

"Yeah, the treatments the Kamino's give the primes for the procedure, eventually kills them . . . years later." She said it matter-of-factly.

"How do you know," Cam asked.

Videsse did not answer.

With no reply, Cam continued, "Still, me, I've got no one like me. No people. Kind of lonely, I guess. That's all I meant. Never belonged to anyone."

Videsse moved another peg. "I doubt that. Those chin tats say differently."

Cam rubbed his chin over the matching triple black lines midway up his jawline on either side. "Yeah, well, my mother was a slave, I guess. And I guess, I was the third child of hers. Three lines, see? But other than that, who knows . . . Oh, I wouldn't go there. You sure? Your death, ha!"

"Boots, shouldn't you let the new person win if you want them to play again?"

"Yeah, I've seen you work. If you win, there will _never_ be another game."

Videsse actually laughed. It was not the loud guffaw, we would hope someday to hear from her, but it was something, and if it was not from the gut, this single outburst seemed to escape from a locked fortress somewhere else; a purely accidental escape.

"Well, you are smarter than you look."

Cam beamed with pride. "Sure am." He watched eagerly as she moved the Rook Na at the finish of her turn.

"Do you remember bein' a slave?" Videsse asked.

"Nah, my first memories are just growing up on the streets. Older kids protected some of the younger ones for a while, until they wanted what you had, then-it's on your own."

"You probably were released when the Galactic Senate outlawed slavery years back-though still, Nar Shaddaa has the illegal trade, I guess." She waved her hand at Cam as if to imply his previous slavery at Felga's palace. "Now, the Rook Na gets _you_," Videsse hopped one of Cam's pegs.

Cam nodded as if it was expected. "So, your name's Patch, huh?" He did not comment on the slave trade and changed the subject.

Videsse took a deep breath but restrained herself. "No."

"Then why did Maz call you that?"

"It was a name the man who raised me called me by, 'cause I could fix his ships."

"That's who you were yelling at earlier?"

"Yup."

A minute of silence followed as pegs were moved and the Rook Na hunted them.

Cam broke the silence. "That man's dead now?"

"Yeah." More silence and more fingers on pegs followed.

Cam could not keep quiet long. "I didn't think that name meant what you said it meant."

Videsse tilted her head. Cam received it as a license to continue.

"What I mean is I thought of a patch that covers a hole in your clothes. Maybe he had a hole. Maybe he needed you."

Videsse did not answer. She pushed a few fallen strands of hair behind her ear and continued playing the game as if all her focus was directed toward it, which it was not.

"No one's ever needed me," Cam said almost so low that it appeared only his lips moved. "Anyway," Cam then spoke at an appropriate volume. "I assume I can't call you _Patch_."

"You got that right," Videsse said dryly.

"Then what is your name?"

"Dark Star."

Cam was quick to reply. "Nope, no, no, nope. That's a nickname. Nicknames are for people that need each other. And we don't need each other. I can't call you Patch. You can't call me Boots. My name is Cam H'darr. You can call me Cam."

The childish logic was ridiculous and Videsse cringed at the idea of giving up her real name. However, the appeal of Cam's reasoning, that they did not need each other, overpowered her reservation.

"Fair enough . . . Cam," Videsse said. "I'm Videsse Otlell. You can call me Dess."

Cam nodded. "Though Dess is kind of a nickname. I'll let it slide, 'cause, stars to heaven, Videsse is a mouthful."

Videsse smiled, and though she did not laugh, it was almost a possibility.

"And with that," Cam moved his last piece. "You lose."

Videsse crossed her arms. "Fine. Best out of three."


	22. Episode X Arkania

Arkania was a light blue-grey planet, white at its poles, with only a band of darker grey at its equator where the ice was less prevalent. It was a planet covered in tundra, and though it had seasons due to its widely elliptical orbit, its temperature at the equator was never higher than thirty-seven degrees Celsius and never lower than negative thirty. The poles were covered in a permanent freeze, and hardly any of its inhabitants lived there. Its weak white star, Olim, lived distantly so that if a terrestrial held their arm at full extension, the star's diameter would only be half the width of a fifth finger, or sixth. Icy mountains covered most of the terrain, but some rolling hills existed in between the four global mountain regions. It was in these hills that most of the cities were founded.

_Slave-1_ materialized from hyperspace, a new star in the vast galaxy, a dark star as another galactic poet would muse. Cam leaned forward from the passenger seat to look at the novel planet, eager to see the new locale; never had he been to so many exotic places, never had he been anywhere.

"That's it?" he asked.

"Guess so," Videsse answered loudly enough for Cam to hear, his passenger seat positioned beneath the cockpit. She adjusted the control switch above her to release the navigation for manual control. "Looks cold."

"So, what are we going to do? Look around for acolytes?" Cam inquired.

"Something like that," Videsse replied. She checked to ensure her HoloNet console was on and pulled up a topographical schematic. After locating the planet's the largest city, she directed the ship to orbit counter to Arkania's rotation. The city was Adascopolis, and it was eighty-five degrees west of _Slave-1_'s current position.

While the ship silently floated around the planet, Videsse exited her seat and retreated to the cargo bay. Her hand unlatched a door on the wall, not the one that Cam had hidden in. A chest slid out and opened on its own. Videsse removed boot charges and loaded them. New grenades found their place on her hip.

Cam snuck in behind her. "What are you bringing?"

Videsse grabbed another dozen power cells, more than usual. "It's cold down there. I'll need more of these to keep the infrared coils working in my armor." She looked at Cam. "And we're gonna need to find you something to cover you. Planetside, I guess." She stopped, lowered her head and rubbed her temples.

"What's the matter?" Cam asked.

"Nothin'," Videsse replied. "Just a headache." She wiped her forehead and the equipping resumed.

She clipped on an extra hard-cased pouch to her hip and filled it with the power cells and a few tracking devices. "Choices . . ." she muttered to herself. "Cloaking is gonna be a power drain." She felt the compact cloaking device at the small of her back. She almost removed it but decided to keep her options open.

The HoloNet blared suddenly, as if it could blare in any other way, and without a second to spare, Videsse was in the cockpit. A man spoke over the COMM in a language that Viddess did not recognize. The language contained mostly voiced consonants, giving it a humming sound, which might have produced an almost musical character, except for the overrepresentation of palatal stops and trills, thus adding an unpleasant harshness to the language. She pounded her fist on the communication button.

"This is Dark Star, a trader. Please respond in Basic." To observe that this reply was rapid is not to imply that this reply was without instantaneous and surgical forethought. Which of her many aliases to use, and what purpose she was present for, were specifically chosen. She knew that the acolytes would have found her previous alias, Ohara Fett, to be associated with the stolen ship. She also considered that anyone who knew of her investigating its theft was dead in Felga's throne room, so Dark Star was a safe alias to use, and may still carry with it the threat earned from Felga's death, if not the reason.

The man replied in the foreign language and seemed irritated. Three _Needle-Class_ ships appeared as if from nowhere; two sidled up to her ship and one behind her. The _Needle-Class_ ships were slender one-man snub fighters and appeared as delicate, swift, and deadly as their name implied. Each snub fighter had a narrow ten-meter body, no more than one meter thick, that extend between the swollen sublight drive at the stern and the arrowhead cockpit at the bow. Their seven-meter lateral stabilizers were thin elliptical rings and divided the ships in half. An electrical web crackled in the space within the dual elliptical rings; a plasma beam weaponry system.

"He doesn't sound happy," Cam noted from behind Videsse.

"Shut up, Cam," Videsse stated. She maintained her direction but slowed the ship a bit "This is an independent trade ship. Does anyone speak Basic?" she requested again.

The electric webs of the following _Needle-Class_ coalesced into a pulsating center.

Videsse noticed it on her viewscreen. "They're preparing to fire." She activated the rear shields, and gripped the control arm tightly, preparing for a fight. Her knuckles tightened as the white tendons under her skin showed. Her shoulders raised as her body leaned away from the seat.

However, before any erratic flying was needed, the COMM responded with a heavy accent. "What is your trade, Dark Star?"

Videsse's knuckles eased and she pressed the COMM with her left hand but did not release her grip with the right. "I am a merchant, here for the diamond trade."

There was an uncomfortable pause, while the ships remained motionless, and the planet glided past them.

"Where is your home port?" the unfriendly voice replied.

Videsse thought quickly, not wanting to give any indication of where she was from, where she had just visited, or why she was here. "Malastare," she replied, knowing that Malastare, being rich in fuel reserves would explain her financial resources. She anticipated the scrutiny.

"Do you have a Trade Privilege License?" the voice continued.

Here, Videsse had no choice for an answer. By choosing Malastare, a Senate affiliate, her only answer was an affirmative. It was a test. To deny trade privilege would create suspicion; to affirm it would only hinder her reception if Arkania was hostile to Senate sovereignty, which was uncertain. Cam, surprisingly, was quiet for the first time, and not without effort, although the possibility of being blown to space dust did help close his mouth. How long that would last, we will soon see.

"Yes," Videsse answered finally, and put her hand to her forehead in anticipation.

There was another silence. One could only assume the Arkanian officer was running through a database; which one and for what purpose was not revealed.

Videsse returned her hand from her forehead to the control arm, her thumbs rubbing the top of each hand bar.

Cam, as I mentioned before, held his voice for an unusually long time, though short by any other standard, and it was here where his self-control met its limit.

"Why did you tell them we were diamond traders? We're looking for Dark Side worshippers," Cam asked abruptly, grabbing her shoulder and leaning over her.

"Shut up, Cam," Videsse ordered, but then rethought the order. "There are going to be hundreds of all kinds of worship temples on this planet, just like everywhere else, I assume. Looking for Dark Side worshippers will be like looking for a needle in quinto grain. These acolytes showed up at my doorstep in a _Marek Hornet;_ not an inexpensive ship. They also paid off Felga for permission to search Nar Shaddaa. These acolytes have money. And this planet's wealthy sit on their diamonds, like a Krayt dragon on Au gold. So that's where we start . . . if they let us in, that is."

"If they let us in, that is" was an accurate statement, for the Arkanians were not going to. The COMM spoke at that moment. "Dark Star, you have been denied entry. Remove your ship from Arkanian jurisdiction immediately, or be subject to Arkanian law for trespass aggression."

Cam tilted his head. "What does that mean?"

"It means you need to get strapped in."

Cam disappeared in an instant. Videsse's white tendons appeared again.


	23. Episode X What Terrah Would Have Done

Now, I realize, that you may not be familiar with cloaking devices; their history, how they work, their limitations, and requirements. You have seen at this point, our heroine use her personal cloak; a device often used by her mother, and adopted by Videsse. This tech, like everything else, had its uses and limitations. Foremost is the fact that, compared to all her other tech, it demanded the largest energy requirements. So much that no other powered tech could function when the cloak was activated; that included her leg brace support. Thus, when activated she, not having the strength from her brace, would limp, though no one could see it.

The same liability was also present when equipped on a ship. However, this did not prevent its use historically. Grand Moff Tarkin of the Empire had a cloaking device on his personal corvette, the _Carrion Spike_. Prior to that, Asaj Ventress, the assassin, used one on her starship, the _Banshee, _in her attempt to assassinate Count Dooku of the Separatists. More recently, the _Millenium Falcon_ was fitted with one temporarily, in the now well known Lebeya battle of the previous Galactic Civil War where that cloak was consequently destroyed beyond repair. Here, Terrah Ottlel, who was fond of her personal cloak, had equipped _Slave-1_ with a cloak of its own, years prior to Videsse taking command of the ship.

This cloak was a visual cloak, distinct from the more common signature cloak that hid a ship from most tracking monitors. The visual cloak, actually made the ship invisible to the naked eye, much like Videsse's personal cloak. However, it did not hide _Slave-1_'s signatures, thus if known to be present, her ship could be found without much effort. A visual cloak's strength relied on stealth and more importantly, inattention. Its weakness, like the personal cloak, was that no other ancillary systems would function while the cloak was activated; this included the shields and weaponry. Essential systems, such as the sublight drives, were still active but functioned at limited capacity.

Now, why did I take the time to distract us from our heroine's story? Because Videsse was about to use this tech in a way, as you will see, consistent with her method of fighting in general; our heroine being, if nothing else, consistent.

First, two ion cannon blasts plunged into the forward snub fighter, melting into a web of electrical filaments that enveloped the Arkanian ship and left it incapacitated. Second, and at almost the same instant, _Slave-1_ vanished from sight, Videsse activating the cloaking device.

From the two rear snub fighters' perspectives, _Slave-1_ disappeared obviously, and their leading pilot's ship now in view, appeared unaffected. It took them all of a millisecond to realize that their lead ship was offline. Adrenaline sharpened their attention as they realized Videsse's ship was cloaked and they darted their gaze at their signature monitors.

Unfortunately for them, Videsse had not dived for the planet (the obvious move) but pulled up into a loop. The half-second of confusion suffered by the Arkanians was enough. Their eyes had just come to rest on their monitors. _Slave-1_'s red heat signature was present, although above them, unexpectedly. The cloak was already removed and her ion cannons had fired.

The _Needle-class_ snub on the starboard was enveloped in the crackling electric storm, it's plasma-weaponized stabilizers fizzling into a vacuum, dead; and it's pilot slamming the stale console in frustration.

The second snub fighter had time to react and accelerated like a dart, the _Slave-1_'s ion blast missing only by a few meters astern. It made a sharp cut pulling up and starboard. The _Needle-class_ starfighter was faster and more agile than _Slave-1_, and before Videsse knew it, the Arkanian was accelerating toward her from starboard. The plasma webs within its stabilizers coalesced and fired. Two lightning quick, parallel flashes of light cut through the black void like blades. Videsse had already pulled as sharply as she could to port; fortunately, both plasma beams thus passed under her hull, as her ship angled away. It was luck, not skill.

"Holy Diathim!" Videsse exclaimed. She knew it was luck. "There's no dodging that!"

There was also no outrunning this ship, and Videsse discerned that. She activated the rear shields to full power, though her gut told her the action was probably useless against the plasma beams.

The _Needle-class_ ship's plasma web began reforming in its elliptical stabilizers, an indication that it needed a moment to recharge; a blessing for Videsse. She did not want the ship to fire again if it could be prevented. She cut hard to starboard, away from the sleeping Arkanian snub fighters. The pursuit craft mimicked her turn, but being much faster, the quarter-second response time resulted in the fighter travelling twenty meters further than _Slave-1's_ path before its mimicked turn. It then accelerated and was back on her tail.

Videsse noticed the wide turn. She was no novice, and knew what that meant and what her plan was. She spun the ship to port, parallel with the sleeping snubs, and watched the Arkanian respond in the same arc as before. When he was again lined up with her astern, the plasma cannons now coalesced into pulsing orbs ready to fire, she pulled hard to the port and went between the sleeping fighters.

The Arkanian took his thumb off of the trigger, worried he might hit a friendly target, as he followed her. Videsse whirled again to port placing the rear snub in between them. The Arkanian cut to port, still behind her but to her left on the opposite side of the snub fighter. He anticipated her next move, and as soon as he had cleared the lagging friendly starship, he cut to starboard.

That was what Videsse was waiting for. She swivelled _Slave-1_ up and to port in a nauseatingly tight corner, and opened up the ion cannons in a rapid trill. Now she was behind him. One of the blasts was likely to find its target, and one did.

The ion pulse blanketed the ship and the Arkanian swore in his harsh tongue, slamming the electrically fizzing console more than once. His starship was dead; the dogfight was over.

Videsse assessed the situation to make sure no new snub fighters were approaching, then she activated the ship's cloak. With the electrical systems down in the Arkanian ships, the they would not be able to follow her angle of entry.

Cam had already unstrapped and was behind her like a shadow, a pattern that was not easily avoided.

"That was amazing!" he congratulated.

Videsse did not respond, and just angled the ship toward the planet.

"You didn't kill those guys," he said. It was more of a question, than a declaration.

"Didn't need to," she answered. "Killin's a good way to get revenge seekers on your tail." She winced a little as she repeated her mother's instructions from a long time ago. It _was _what Terrah would have done.

"You didn't think that way at Felga's," Cam argued.

"Well, that was different," Videsse answered.

"How?"

"It just was." That was what Boba Fett would have done.

Videsse suddenly and spasmodically leaned forward with an unproductive wretch, putting her hand to her mouth.

"What's the matter?" Cam asked.

"Nothin'," she said. "I just think that last turn, made my stomach turn as well."

Cam squinted his eyes and scratched his head. "Mine was fine," he said with pride.

"Good for you." Videsse shook her head, her mouth thinning into a line. Something was not right.


	24. Episode X Why They Are

The planet's terrain slowly became more detailed as they descended. Mountains and valleys were more visible, and settlements came into view. The grey terrain was dotted with small villages, rare and spread out, mostly nestled into the valleys of the hill country where the rivers ran down into bottomless lakes; lakes that currently froze over every night and thawed by midday. The lakes were access points to the thermal aquifers and would thaw before the rest of the planet. These aquifers heated the subterranean water forming hot springs that fed the rivers. Arkanian mountains could be seen in the distance on either side and were jagged and permanently snow-capped. Snow and ice forming from the high humidity built up over throughout the year and then created slow glacial movements downward, cutting more sharp valleys over time. Currently, it was the planet's mild season, summer, and ice only formed overnight on the lowland hills. This was a relative heatwave for the Arkanians. Videsse took it all in and pondered the planetary details as she continued her descending approach to Adascopolis which rested about one hundred kilometers further.

"Huh? That's interesting," she muttered to herself, seeing an aberration in the landscape.

"What?" Cam replied, leaning over the console, his forehead coming to a rest on the viewscreen glass.

Approaching and then beneath them, five hills were artificially leveled and now nestled like stubbed plateaus beneath the neighboring hills. On the flattened surface of these hills, which totaled at least fifty square kilometers, there were hundreds of structures; light blue-grey, durasteel, other curved shell-like cylinders, some spear-headed structures laying on their sides, angular frameworks, and vast flat sheets. Droid crews, massive droid crews, both in size and numbers were involved in construction; from two kilometers above they could be seen.

"What's that?" Cam questioned.

"Capital ships," Videsse answered. She flew over them and slowed her progress slightly, hidden in her cloak.

"That's got to be a hundred," Cam whistled in awe.

"Nah, more like a dozen," Videsse corrected. "Capital ships are huge, Cam. They'll construct them in pieces, then probably take the segments into space to assemble."

"So, they're making an army?" Cam asked. He removed his forehead from the glass, leaving a greasy smear. Videsse rolled her eyes as she saw it.

"A navy," Videsse corrected again. "That may explain why we were denied entry, though that's just a guess." She pushed forward and resumed her previous speed. "Anyway, it ain't our problem right now." She stopped talking.

Adascopolis now came into view. It was a city sprawled over five hills; five hills that were indiscernible under its light blue-grey skyscrapers. Arkanian architecture was sharp and ice-like, giving the impression that the city was an isolated mountain range punctuating the rolling hills like icicle spires.

Videsse directed _Slave-1_ to fly around the perimeter, looking for a place to land and hide her ship. She figured that an alert would have been sent to any regulatory authorities that a _Firespray_ starship evaded the Planetary Guard. Eventually, she chose a spot nestled in a dry valley a kilometer from the city's edge. Once beneath the cover of the hills, she dropped the cloak. _Slave-1_ materialized and steam vents released as it angled onto its stern for landing. Videsse and Cam now faced the sky. Well, Videsse did. Cam had slid and fell backward to the rear wall on top of the retractable seat which was now the floor. He thudded to a stop and an audible "umph". He was fine, but Videsse was tired of warning him to buckle in. She smiled to herself and brushed a stray hair behind her ear.

Once the ship came to a rest, she turned it off and found her way back to Cam, who was rubbing the back of his neck, like he did when anything hurt him anywhere, as if somehow the back of his neck was the nexus of all pain. He shot a glare at Videsse, but did not make any accusation. Videsse did not either; she did not need to.

She threw two oily rags at him. "Wrap those around your head and face."

"To keep me warm?"

"No," Videsse replied. "The acolytes that sold you to Felga saw your face. I don't want them to see it again. We'll get something to keep you warm as we go." She donned her own helmet as she said this, then tossed him a credit chip as well. "No stealin' if you don't need to."

The air was cold, just above freezing, and the summer sun only gave enough heat to melt the frost off of the knee-high sage bushes. On most planets, the temperature would increase as the day aged, and though that was true here, it was not as significant as one would hope. The ice would melt, but that was it. The cold wind would blow on the tops of the hills, and the humid air in the valley would still chill the bones.

Cam shivered uncontrollably at first, before the undulating hike up and down the hills warmed him enough.

The ground topped with a stubby plant cover cracked like dry noodles when frost-covered, but sank under the feet like a sponge where the frost had melted it on the sunlit hilltops. The only plant life that had any height to it were the sage bushes, that as I had stated previously, only grew to a height of about sixty centimeters.

It is here that I am tempted to take a hiatus from our story as our heroine and her companion are trekking through this tundra, and we have quite a while before they reach their final destination; they will have to find warm clothes for Cam, and information about which diamond guild to petition (and that being tedious and uninteresting, full of questioning mostly suspicious and ethnocentric individuals). I will instead use this moment to defend the Arkanian culture, which is in need of the defense, since you will see the worst of it, and I am afraid that you may judge them based on this small sampling. Videsse certainly will. However, as she can not hear me and you can, I will take this moment for the sake of the Arkanians, and for you, to explain why these people are the way they are.

To begin, this planet was at one time a tropical one, being much closer to its star one hundred thousand years ago. Thus, an incredible amount of biomass had at one time existed on this planet, but now the carbon subterranean veins are all that remains of this once lush and vibrant planet. Its orbit is unstable and gradually Arkania moves further from its sun. In a few thousand years it will be an ice planet, and in a thousand more it will be dead, as the planet's orbit elongates at a quicker rate every year. The Arkanians have been forged in this. It was at least ten thousand years ago that they crouched around their fires for warmth, burning the stump sage-the kind that Cam, had just tripped over as he descended the opposite side of another hill. The stump sage was one of the planet's about twenty different sage varieties. The Arkanian's of old huddled by their fires for warmth, their orange faces warmed by the meager flames, as they began to tell stories of the cold, and heroes, and ones that were strong enough and intelligent enough to outwit the harsh land. Thus, the central craft of their species was formed. Storytelling, it was the diamond of their culture, formed through difficulty and trials, and if Videsse could only see how she herself was being formed in that same way, she might find a kinship through suffering with these people, but alas I do understand our heroine's strengths, yet also this weakness, and I regret that she will never see that parallel.

Still, the Arkanians became expert craftsmen and craftswomen of the art of oral narration and lore. Their stories were distinct in their forms, transitioning between first, second, and third-person fluidly, and also between tenses in order to add emphasis, thus creating a narrative, where the listener was drawn in almost as a character. Certainly, each storyteller would insert him or herself into the story as well, so with that subtly and without one consciously recognizing it, the story became, not a story only about the past, but one about the present, not a story only about the hero or heroine, but about the listener and even the storyteller. The art was that the orator would invite the listeners in, so that in the warm fire-lit hut-much like the small thatch woven huts that Videsse and Cam could now see in the next valley-yes, in these huts they could push the cold out, and enter into another place away from the wind and ice that threatened their very lives.

It was from this that they developed their own written form, using the pin sage-the same one that Cam had just scratched his legs on, trudging down another hill as he followed Videsse toward the herding community that marked the furthest habitation of the city. The pin sage's leaves were sharp thin and hollow, the perfect shape to form the tip of a stylus, and when cut at an angle it would wick ink, ink collected from the black mollusk that lived in their lakes. Their written graphemes were sharp, yet connected-artistic, yet harsh, much like their language, every aspect of their culture being a paradox of sterness and beauty, ice and firesides. They taught themselves language, and writing, and art. From the written form, their stories were collected and shaped on parchment, and naturally, art evolved. Brushes were handcrafted from the small wisp sage, and paint hues were formed from various plant and animal dyes to make dark colors, deep browns, blacks, burnt reds, grey-blues, and drab yellows. It was an art not beautiful in color, but in form. It was an art that was everywhere, on their mud doorposts and frames (Videsse and Cam may have seen the etchings, but their eyes did not perceive them). The images were woven into their Lago wool clothing, embroidered into every fabric; heroes, and ice, and fire.

Cam moved from one conical hut to another, attempting to find someone that would be willing to sell one of their woven garments. He was met with condescending and suspicious looks, these people being skeptical of any that did not suffer in the way they had. They would not speak Basic, though they knew it; they would not take Galactic credits, though they could. Here even, the herders, Arkanian's second lowest class, only above the slave class; these even looked with a haughty air upon outsiders. However as with all people, there was still one that had compassion on the shivering child, an old woman, her dark orange face reddened with age, and grooved with lines; this woman finally spoke Basic with him and did offer a garment.

He did pay for it. However, he did not pay for the dried Lago meat that he pocketed. He figured it was payment for the frustration; the frustration of the people _and_ the small needle-nosed biting flies; flies that somehow survived in the cold, and would not relent in their air attack on Cam. If Cam had bothered to look closely at the insects, he would have seen the prototype of the _Needle-class_ ships they had encountered earlier. Alas, it is one of the many pieces of this culture that Cam would miss.

Videsse had difficulty, as well, as she asked about the diamond guilds, which the herders knew very little about. If she would have asked them about the small ruminants they raised, she might have had more luck, though even that would have been unlikely. As it was, they only knew enough to point her toward the south end of the city, and she was fortunate to have that much help from them, not realizing that even that small information was a grace given to a foreigner.

As they walked toward the city, the huts became closer together, and their construction became more well-developed, metal and clay replaced the thatch and mud, yet the dwellings still maintained their conical, almost icicle-like appearance. The materials that made up these habitations were all resources that were found on this planet for the Arkanians were not a people that would gladly receive anything from the outside galaxy. The outside was dangerous, as they had learned over the millennia. They were self-sufficient, and resilient.

It was in the peri-urban sector that Videsse and Cam saw the slave class for the first time among the walking masses. They looked like everyone else, but many followed head down in the shadow of their master or mistress. Their position was obvious, but it was not based on a racial or species divide. At first glance, the practice did not seem different from the illegal slavery on Nar Shaddaa. In fact, all slavery, even Arkanian slavery, was illegal after the Galactic Senate proclamation three years prior. However, this slavery was unique to Arkanian culture, and they were unwilling to cease the practice. It was a method of debt and credit, and it was voluntary. Those that could not pay for goods or services, would offer their lives in payment, for a duration up to four Arkanian years (about seven Galactic standard years). Those that submitted to this, were seen as lower-class-citizens, for it was looked upon as being financially unwise by the culture. It was limited in its duration; limited, except that many four year periods were reestablished back-to-back. There was a working-class, that received wages for services rendered, but the slave class chose to receive their wages prior to rendering services.

Videsse recognized the slave pattern, even if she misinterpreted the entirety of it. "Cam," she whispered to him. "You better follow me like one of these slaves."

Cam's face flushed purple with anger, "Like Chaos, I will!" He shoved her.

"Listen," Videsse countered unemotionally. "These people don't trust us. If they see we follow this slavery idea, they'll see we aren't friends of the Senate. I think it'll go a long way. Otherwise, no one's gonna talk to us."

Cam thought hard. His eyes, which were the only visible feature from his hooded sherpa, were evidence of the intellectual struggle. Finally, he assented. "Fine, but I can stop anytime I want." That was enough for Videsse.

Videsse was right, and the plan worked. The Arkanians resisted their inquiries at first, but after seeing Cam's submission, they were more willing to at least answer a few questions. Who knows, _perhaps she was an Arkanian under that helmet_, they might have reasoned.

Videsse and Cam were making progress and by the afternoon they were well into the city. The sharp blue-grey spires of their highrises closed in around them, as did the shoulders and orange skinned, white-eyed faces of the citizens. To Videsse, the people all looked the same; white hair, orange skin, pale pupiless eyes, plain straight-lined synthetic clothes, which if Videsse had thought about it, were distinct from the woolen garments of the herding class. Though there were many features that created distinction between individuals, the hue of their skin, the hairstyle, the shape of their face, height, girth and on and on; but Videsse would simply see uniformity, especially in their arrogance.

I hope that I have adequately given a reason for that unfortunate impression, as we enter into the diamond guild sector, for here that arrogant impression will be highest and for another reason; the diamonds themselves.

The Arkanian diamond was unique to the galaxy. It was blue and glassy, shimmering in the light, pristinely pure, and clear. These diamonds were not discovered until a few centuries ago when the Arkanians had developed the technology to mine the coal veins. Once found, immediately the Arkanians recognized two things; how valuable this gem was, and how it mirrored the heart of their people, formed through fire and ice. It was everything that the Arkanian's valued about themselves, and even their architecture was meant to represent that, diamond spires growing from the heart of the mountains.

Within a century, the diamond trade had begun, and Arkanians now found themselves to be among the wealthiest in the galaxy. Thus, their technology soared and their cities blossomed. However, their distrust for outsiders remained, especially when outsiders demanded that their culture conform. Beginning trade with the galaxy produced wealth, but also gave them trade associations; thus political associations. It was those associations that made them uncomfortable and currently pressed them to change. Planets that knew nothing of their people and misinterpreted many of their customs and culture-their economic slave debts being one of many. Many wondered if they should even engage in the diamond trade, yet others could not resist the wealth.

So here we come to the doorstep of one of the diamond guilds, a crystal high-rise, over a hundred meters at its base, and as we arched our necks upward to the point of discomfort, we could see the ascending skyscraper seem to pierce the sky, its pinnacle invisible to us. How many people were in this building? It was higher than its neighbors, but not by much (if two hundred meters was not much).

Dozens of orange faces entered and exited the elongated doors, which also were vastly tall, ten times the height of any Arkanian. Videsse and Cam stopped for a moment to take in the idea of the building's height and mass.

Videsse leaned over to Cam, "Those capital ships we saw earlier . . . they'll be about as long as this is tall."

Cam's eyes widened and his mouth dropped at the thought.

Videsse looked back up, then suddenly turned her head down to the ground and gripped the sides of her head. Looking up made the headache worse, and nausea returned.

"I could use a drink," she whispered to herself, but then recanted. "No, I don't need anything." As she said this, she noticed her hands were trembling subtly, ever so subtly. She made two fists and then shook her hands as if the tremors would drip off of them like water.

Cam did not pay attention, still gazing at the buildings in twilight awe.

"Enough, Cam," Videsse said after shaking her head and collecting herself. "Time to go in."


	25. Episode X The Diamond Guild

They walked through the crystalline doorway and stopped at the guard just on the inside right. Videsse removed her firearms, belt, and blades, handing them to the guard. This was becoming such a common occurrence it was almost natural. So was her body language of disapproval.

The guard looked her over with suspicion, raised a handheld scanner and moved it up and down her and Cam.

"Horusuk, Rudcka," the guard commanded.

Videsse raised her hands with a gesture of confusion. "Do you speak Basic?"

The guard's face was stern and cold. "Your gauntlets, Rudcka," he said through gritted teeth. _Rudcka_ was a term used by Arkanians to describe an outsider. It was derogatory, and though Videsse did not know what it meant, she was sure to catch its intent. This guard, though he could not see her face, knew she was not Arkanian. How he knew the Basic-speaking woman, the only one in the city that was clothed in full armor, weapons, and a helmet was not an Arkanian, we must assume was a part of his training or at least attributed to his astute observation skills. Whatever the inconceivable reason, we must treat it as another detail of the story that must remain a mystery.

Videsse restrained her comments and dropped the gauntlets on the clear crystal table in front of her. The olive skin of her hands was now evident as if that was needed to show herself as an alien.

"It's been a while since any security managed to disarm me completely," she muttered to Cam as the guard waved them to enter. "Whatever."

The entry hall was vast and open. Everything was blue glassy crystal; the walls, the floor, the icicle-pinned ceiling twenty meters above them. The floor diffusely lit floor beneath them gave the impression that one was walking on a sea of glass, the same light that caused the icicle spires above them to glow and fill the room with a cerulean organic light. Again, as I have mentioned previously, their culture was an odd contrast between extremes, and here was no different. The cold dead crystal, with its sharp and rigid lines coexisting with the smooth, living waves of light, like water over ice; the spirit over the material.

It was disorienting at first for Cam, to walk on the glass floor. The crystal seemed to extend forever beneath them and into a dark void. He looked down and felt as if somehow he would fall into it and sink slowly and eternally downward into the dark depths just under the undulations of light; lights that danced as if living spirits, maybe even the undead calling him under. "Hear our tale. Enter our dwelling and listen."

"Cam," Videsse barked. "Keep up."

He raised his eyes from the floor, the trance broken and so he ran a dozen steps to catch Videsse.

The occupied hall, vast as it was, held at least a hundred men and women engaging in business at clear tables. Still, with all those people, it felt empty. On one end there were three guild representatives that stood behind desks, desks that seemed to be an extension of the glass floor as if sections of the crystal had simply been pushed up from beneath. The desks glowed and undulated in the light like the floor and everything. Thus, the faces of the attendants were underlit by this luminescence, giving them a harsh and severe appearance. In contrast to this, these female attendants were three of the most beautiful Arkanians that Videsse had seen to this point, and she did notice that.

Two were busy aiding other businessmen so Videsse walked up to the center desk which was available. The attendant was much taller than Videsse, standing at least a head higher. Her orange skin was paler than most, almost yellow, and her pupilless eyes somehow appeared brighter, even more glassy than the rest of her race. Her hair was long and rich, straight and resting over her left shoulder down to her hip. She wore a white gown, regal-like, which caught the blue waves of light from the desk. Woven scalloped lacework at the neckline was filled with the curved lines of fire, and the sharp lines of ice. A white thin belt, without a buckle, adorned the waist of her hourglass form. The delicate dress silhouetted her hips and traversed down her legs where it barely touched the floor and hid her feet behind a lacy hem.

The unfeminine black-armored form of Videsse approached the table. The contrast was more than evident, the blue-lit eye screens of her helmet looking more droid-like than human. Videsse set her elbows down on the desk, the click of her elbow plates on the table made the attendant blink her eyes. The attendant delicately clasped her hands beneath her waist.

"Don roosa, kharrin?" she began. Her voice was smooth and melodic. Her tone was otherwise.

Videsse assumed what she had said. "Yes, you can help me." She passed a data chip across the table as she often had done in the past in other deals. "I'm lookin' to talk with your president about buyin' diamonds."

The woman covered it with her hand and pushed it back. "I'm afraid I cannot help you." She spoke in Basic. "We sell pristine-class diamonds, far above your class, kharrin."

"_Kharrin_, not _Rudcka_? I appreciate the hospitality. Please reconsider," Videsse was learning quickly. She bowed her head, placed her hand over the attendant's hand, and pushed it back across the table. "Simply look at its contents. Then I will leave."

The woman's face did not change, but she did slide the chip behind the table where a clear chip port was hidden. A moment later the surface of the blue table lit with numbers, long numbers, hundreds of numbers. The woman's eyes enlarged, and if she would have allowed it, her mouth would have dropped.

Even so, the attendant maintained her composure and removed the chip. "This is yours?" she questioned as if it was preposterous.

"Every credit," Videsse replied. "It is just a statement, mind you. Of course, you know that. But if you wonder if it is a doctored chip, you may compare it to the Nets. I am patient. Especially for as large of a gem purchase as I desire. You simply can't be hasty with that much. Or too cautious." Too many words, my dear Videsse.

The attendant did not smile, in fact not a muscle of her face moved, as if her face was simply a mask. "What is your name?"

"Dark Star."

The woman stared blankly at Videsse for a second as if Videsse would offer another, more credible, name. "Very well," she stated, again with her melodic voice, a voice one could listen to for hours if she had a story to tell, which she did like all of us do. "Wait here while I verify this." She looked over Videsse's shoulder toward the guard.

Videsse nodded, leaned in and rested her head on her knuckles. "No problem."

The attendant paused, considering Videsse's ungracefulness, but again composing her own expression, then she smoothly turned to the wall behind her.

A section of the wall which initially appeared to be without any cleavage, slid down into the floor forming a crystal doorway for the woman to pass through. Once through, the crystal slipped back into place in complete and unnatural silence.

"I don't think she was impressed with your name," Cam almost giggled.

Videsse shook her head. "I don't care."

"It is a weird name anyway . . . _Dark Star_. What is that even?" Cam philosophized. To him that was philosophy.

"It's a dead star," Videsse answered. "An invisible one. One that destroys anything that gets near it."

Cam nodded his head. "That makes a lot of sense."

Videsse did not know if she should be offended at that comment. She cupped her face, her elbows still resting on the table and changed the subject. "Ugh," she exhaled forcefully. "That woman makes me sick."

Cam scrunched his face in confusion. "Why? She seemed nice to me, I mean compared to everyone else here."

Videsse spun around and leaned back on the table with her elbows, her legs angled forward. "Of course you would say that. You're just smitten 'cause she's pretty." Videsse watched the guard who was also watching her.

"No," Cam replied but reconsidered. "Well, yeah. But I know someone prettier."

Videsse's head rolled. "Ugh." She had walked directly into that trap. Fortunately, she had a tried-and-true response for escaping from unwanted conversations. "Whatever."

Twenty seconds of silence followed, a twenty seconds that was becoming a regular and welcomed guest between Videsse and Cam.

It was broken when Cam could not stand it anymore. "That chip was real?" It was both a statement and an inquiry.

"Yeah," Videsse replied, still watching the front door.

"How did you get all of that? I didn't know that much money existed."

"Stealin', investin', bounties, and farmin'. In that order, too. And I don't spend much, except for this kind of stuff. I guess, then I spend a lot. But still, only on this."

"But your ship has to be expensive."

Videsse nodded. "Yeah, all three of them are."

"Three!"

"I only paid for one, though-with stolen goods."

"The one we're going after?"

"Yup."

"Why go after this one?"

"Cause it's mine, and no one takes anything away from me. No one-" she broke off.

"You must be the richest person in the galaxy." Cam produced a whistle between his teeth.

"_You_ would see it that way," Videsse replied. "Really, I'm just the smartest."

Cam straightened up. "She's back."

Videsse stood up and turned to see the woman silently locate herself at her position behind the desk. She slid the chip back to Videsse.

"President Khardala will see you for two minutes. Follow me, kharrin."

This was a surprise to Videsse, in fact. She turned to Cam, her slave mistress ruse returned. "Follow me, slave," she said imperiously, and followed the attendant behind the table and through the crystal door.

Inside they found themselves in a hall of glass, thousands of diamonds displayed within, like ice crystals frozen within ice sheets. They picked up the light and refracted it in thousands upon thousands of stars that flickered through the hall and cast white, yellow and red gleams throughout the hall. The hall seemed to move under the influence of these dazzling pinpoints and Cam found himself disoriented again, tripping over something that was not there. He scuffled and stayed upright, then looked at the ground pretending that there was some defect in the smooth floor. However, he had no need for the feigned excuse because the women did not notice.

The hall ended with another room, a room that appeared to be a type of waiting room. Fifteen hard blue crystal chairs formed a semicircle in the center of the room. Like the tables, they appeared to be a part of the floor and glowed like everything else. The walls were smooth, but it was implied that many invisible doorways were hidden in them.

The Arkanian led them to the right and one of those invisible ports manifested in front of her. They entered, finding themselves now in a smaller room with a large center table, and chairs arranged around it. There is no need to again repeat that these structures were the same as everything else seen thus far.

The Arkanian waved her arm to direct them to the table, though not to a seat. "President Khardala will be with you momentarily." She then took two steps backward to stand just inside the door that slid closed behind her.

Without two seconds passing, the table lit in front of them, and a holograph appeared. It was unlike the grainy holographs that were common in the galaxy. The Arkanian technology was unique, smooth and two dimensional, like looking at an image in a mirror, a mirror that had one or two cracks in it. The sharp-angled cleavages of the image were the only distortions present. The holograph itself, was an Arkanian man, tall, dark orange, with short hair no more than a few centimeters in length allowing his rounded human-like ears to be visible. The holograph's position made it so that it appeared the man was standing on the table making his height even more impressive. He donned a white and simple attire, except for the blue centimeter hem of his sleeves and neck, which had the sharp and smooth complexity we have seen previously in all of their clothing. His hands were clasped behind his back.

"Dark Star," the president began. His voice was deep and loud, and he seemed to exhale more heavily than what was natural with his vowels.

Videsse bowed her head, "It is an honor President Khardala."

Khardala simply looked down on her with no response to Videsse's salutation.

"Your business deal on Nar Shaddaa ended abruptly," he accused.

Videsse smiled under her helmet. Perhaps this was the reason the president was not meeting with her in person, she reasoned. "I appreciate your directness, President." She looked up. "News travels fast."

"For me it does," he replied. "Though, what your deal was is still a mystery. And until I am comfortable with that, your credits mean nothing to me."

Videsse decided to stick with what she knew of the Arkanian culture. "It was a slave deal. This slave." She waved to Cam without looking. "Felga was not a businesswoman first, but a slave dealer. And her _deal_ was to change the conditions multiple times." This was generally true of Felga, and Videsse relied on Khardala having a similar history with her. Anyone that had known what Videsse's real purpose with Felga was dead but the truth that Cam had joined her at that point might have been verified if he had looked that far into it.

Khardala stared blankly at her, much like his attendant had. "Very well." It was difficult, Videsse was now recognizing, to determine if these people believed anything one would say-their expressions were so controlled and ambiguous. "And now, you want to do business with this guild." He must have believed her.

"Yes," Videsse replied. "I know Felga had purchased diamonds from you in the past." She did not know, though it did not matter. "And I, now, would like to fill that void. You have seen my credit statements. I am looking for a substantial aggregate."

Khardala did not move, his hands still clasped behind his back. "And your price?"

"Ten Mil', to start. Then more as I move the diamonds," she answered.

"And you think you could move that quantity?" Khardala asked, still appearing unimpressed.

"I have moved a lot more than that," Videsse replied.

Khardala nodded. It was the first movement seen from him, and it was very slight. He directed his gaze to the female attendant. "Gehenna," he ordered. "Hardin'shah na ghardin kha."

She nodded. "Rah, Har Khardala."

"My attendant will arrange a cache of our diamonds," Khardala stated. "You may return tomorrow for inspection."

"My thanks, President Khardala," Videsse said, then raised her hand. It trembled, and she quickly lowered it. "One more question, if I may?"

He did not reply, yet simply gazed at her with a sharp glare. Videsse assumed that was an assent.

"It is my custom, to donate a substantial offering to the place of my worship on every planet that I visit. Would you please direct me to a place sufficient for someone such as I, a _Dark_ Star." She emphasized the word _dark_.

"I am not a guide," he seemed agitated at the question. The added emphasis on consonants hinted this. "There are many temples for every spirit within our city of light. Find them on your own time," he answered, but his gaze seemed to become more directed.

"Ah, but in a city of light, I may find it difficult to find _my_ temple," she countered.

He looked again to the attendant, then back to Videsse. "If we are done with the business of diamonds, then it is time for you to leave."

There were a few uncomfortable seconds of silence, Videsse's plan had not worked, for the last question was the whole reason for the interview. Maybe she was not direct enough, she thought.

Cam then spoke out of turn and convention. "Don't worry, Mistress. The dark side will provide."

Both the attendant and Khardala furrowed their brows. Khardala dropped his hands from being clasped behind his back, and the image disappeared.

Videsse almost glared at Cam, but she reconsidered. Words that Maz had said came to mind.

"Come, slave," she ordered. She looked at the Arkanian attendant, "Gehenna," she addressed her, having caught her name from Khardala. "Thank you for your time." Videsse bowed her head. The woman blinked her eyes, then in a fluid movement turned to lead them from the room.


	26. Episode X The Dark Master is Coming

Something was wrong with Videsse. She was not unaware of it. The headaches were getting worse every minute. The nauseousness came and went in increasing waves. The tremors in her hands were becoming more violent, and the pain in her lame leg sharpened. She could feel the muscle fasciculations of her thighs; evidence that the tremors in her hands were symptoms of a condition that affected every nerve and fiber of her body.

What was wrong with our heroine? Simply put, there is a price to pay for everything that we love dearly; a price for every person we love, every idea we cherish, and every drink we cradle in the palm of our hand. All of these bind ghostly chains to our hearts, and those chains are the very maladies that haunted our heroine, regardless of how she would deny it. Some bonds are subtle, like the dead lingering among the lovelorn living, their whispers inaudible. Whether they are true whispers or the imaginations of the soul, they are no less tied to the heart with adamant cords. Other fetters are more apparent such as the body's yearning for a drink. Although Videsse's will was a stronghold keeping the amber liquid at bay, the body would not be as easily beaten. It had thrust its forces against that wall of will. The siege ramps of tremors, pain, and retching, all have been raised in the hopes of breaching the wall and again tasting a drop of whiskey. If unsuccessful, the eyes and the ears will join the battle with the war machinations of hallucinations and voices, catapulting those fiery missiles over her ramparts. And still, if that should prove fruitless, the last and desperate action of the body will be to throw itself against the heavy gates of Videsse's stubborn resolve, until her very body and mind break and oblivion takes her. Yes, my Videsse, this is the battle that threatens your city and how I mourn for you. If I could have saved you this, if I could have only put my hand on your drink, every time it came to your lips; to be a watchman on the tower calling to you, "The army is on the horizon." But alas, these hands were too weak and my voice too mute for your ears; too much a phantom than a form. The only power given to me is to tell your story. So I must continue the labor, as our heroine and her companion exit the diamond tower and reenter the streets of Adascopolis; a peaceful city passed through by a sieged one.

* * *

"Well, that didn't work," Cam said throwing up his hands.

Videsse did not reply. She walked swiftly and checked her gauntlet display as she sidetracked and darted through the city-walkers.

Cam called out more loudly from behind her, "That didn't work. Now, what are we going to do?"

"Shut up, Cam!" Videsse ordered with a backward glance. "I'm trying to think." Thinking was becoming difficult. Then in an inconsistent moment, she asked Cam, "Why did you say that about the dark side back there?"

"Just something I heard the man that captured me say. I thought it might be something they say." Cam shrugged his shoulders. "You know-code, or something."

Videsse nodded and actually considered that it might have been a "not-bad" comment, possibly, maybe.

She looked up at each building, but could not for long. Her head was throbbing, and her hands were shaking more every minute. She caught a shadow out of her left periphery; a short, knee-height shadow, humanoid. She darted her gaze to the left, but it was nowhere to be seen. Was something watching her, watching her from some unknown plain? However, that would be preposterous, and Videsse knew that. She was certain of it. Yet, here was the first moment that Videsse had the rare feeling so unrecognized in her, fear. Her stomach, her head, her hands, her eyes; the lingering question haunted her more than the shadow, what was happening? A fleeting thought arose from within, _I need a drink_. She banished that thought in her usual fashion. "I don't need anythin'," her voice whispered to herself as if it was an incantation against the invisible world inside of her.

Videsse squinted her eyes behind her mask, trying to push the headache away, only the headache, fear was not an emotion she was willing to admit at that moment. "The Techno guilds," she muttered. "That's where we go next."

She tried to walk fast, but her limp was becoming more evident as the armored brace could not overcome the growing pain. Oblivious, Cam fell back into his slave role and followed a few steps behind in silence. Videsse had discovered where the techno guild tower was located previously by accident, and it would only take ten minutes of brisk walking. However, they never arrived, for a stranger had detoured her plan, or rather restored it.

"You must control that slave's speech," a muted voice came from directly next to her. An unknown man sidled up to Videsse. She was startled, stepped to the left, her hand whipping to her sidearm. The streets were crowded enough, that a man walking closely was not unusual, but the address put her on her guard.

"Peace, Dark Star," his voice was smooth and calm, lacking emotion, and like most of the Arkanian race, beautiful. "The Dark Side has provided." He held his hands open in supination.

The man was light orange compared to most, though not yellow like the woman in the diamond foyer. His hair was long and braided halfway down his back. His simple white tunic and synthetic grey long-vest seemed too thin for the weather and featured the fact that Arkanians were resistant to the cold. The currently four-degree temperature was tantamount to a heatwave for them.

"Walk with me, Dark Star," the man petitioned, puffs of condensing air rose from his mouth as he spoke. "Let us not draw too much attention." He turned his hand in a gesture for Videsse to ease her grip on the blaster.

Passerbys turned their reticent gazes on Videsse's blaster as they roved the streets. She removed her hand from the blaster but was quick to question the man. "Who are you?"

"My name is Nolan," he nodded his head. "A fellow traveler, a fellow seeker of our Dark Master."

These terms were foreign to Videsse and she was trying to process a response through her clouded mind. She nodded back to him. "Thank the stars," she replied. It was an impulsive response but was the most spiritual phrase she could come up with. She saw by the microexpression of his face; a slightly drawn brow, that the response may not have been well received. "Forgive me, brother," she added a familial address. "I am a new devotee in this way. A new acolyte. I know that the Dark Side provides. And in that, I walk. Your presence has proved that to me again."

The micro-expression disappeared into the aloof and ambiguous face of the Arkanian culture. "Walk with me," he stated again, a command this time.

Cam drew in close behind Videsse, so close that he used her as a barrier between him and the Arkanian. Cam's left hand gripped tightly to the side of her midriff, and his right hand drew the scarf up over his nose so only his eyes could be seen.

Videsse swiped at him and began to walk.

"So, either the president or his attendant is one of us," Videsse commented as they walked.

"Yes," Nolan answered. He did not add which one it was.

The streets were crowded and occasionally she had to squeeze by another walker, placing her hand on the back of Nolan awkwardly. He was stiff, his body complementing the cold expression of his face.

"Are you taking me to the temple?" she asked.

"How long have you been an acolyte?"

_Another interrogation_, she thought. "Uh, since I took on the name Dark Star." It sounded like a reasonable transition point and was vague enough so that she may not have to worry about details.

"Where?"

_Not Nar Shaddaa_, she thought again. _He might have been there and familiar with the acolyte sect on that planet._ She did not know for certain, yet this was the same Nolan that had captured Cam and had stolen her ship. Cam, in contrast, was certain having recognized his voice.

"Mandalore," she blurted. It was not the best choice for many reasons; it connected her to Mandalore and therefore her upbringing by Boba Fett, and it was a well-known system that could allow her lies to be refuted if investigated.

She shook her head at the thought of the impulsiveness of her response and inaudibly cursed her foggy thoughts.

"Not Malastare like you told the planetary guard," he countered.

"Ugh-" Videsse gasped. He had ties with the authorities. "That is my home port for my merchant license. And I travel to many places," she rebutted quickly.

Nolan was silent for a few paces as it appeared that he thought about this. "It is a fortunate time for you to join the Dark Way," he said with an altered tone in his voice. It sounded like proselytizing to Videsse more than a simple indicative statement. "Now at the end of all things."

The phrase struck Videsse as ominous, but also ridiculous. "Yes, I agree," was her response. "Very fortunate."

He abruptly stopped, gripped her shoulder, and made her turn to face him. "Do not deceive me, Dark Star." His lips thinned. His brow furrowed, and he showed his gritted teeth. "It is the end of all things for those who would not recognize their need for the Dark Master. And do not be deceived, the Dark Master is at the door. He is coming."

Videsse recognized the change in Nolan's demeanor. Something she had said or done had broken her ruse. "I would like to support the Way, in any way that I can." She bowed her head, trying to mend whatever she could. Would the Dark Master still reject Galactic credits if he thought it came from an unbeliever?

He looked her over and saw the hand of the hidden Cam on her waist. The emotion left his face. "I will find you tomorrow after you inspect the diamond cache. We will talk of the size of your offering then." With that he turned and left, no parting valediction was given.

For a moment Videsse and Cam stood, dumbfounded amidst the flowing masses.

"What happened," Videsse asked herself.

"He figured us out, that's what happened," Cam answered.

"Shut up, Cam. Your voice is giving me a headache." It was not his voice that gave her a headache, yet he received the blame.

She checked her wrist display. A blue blinking light emitted from it.

"Well, what do we do now?" Cam asked, ignoring her diatribe.

"What did I say," Videsse groaned. This time anger was rising, mostly affected by her physical state. She was becoming even more reactive.

"I know, sorry," he quickly said. "I just want to know what we are doing now?"

"Ugh, Cam, we are going back to the ship-"

"Why?"

Videsse gripped the sides of her head, her head throbbing, then she held up her blinking wrist console for Cam to see. "'Cause of this," it was an angry shout, with no playful undertones. "I'm tracking him. Now just shut up and follow me."

"Ahh," Cam nodded with an affirmative and light-hearted assent, still oblivious to Videsse's condition. "Whatever you say."


	27. Episode X No Rest For The Weary

"You look like a Dewback that's been ridden too hard!" Cam exclaimed as Videsse removed her helmet. She closed _Slave-1_'s caudal ramp.

Her hair was wet with sweat, strands falling out of her tight braids and sticking to her face. Beads of perspiration had formed on her forehead and nose. Her eyes were bloodshot and weak, yet still, they darted to the corner of the cargo bay as if she had seen an eskrat scurry for cover.

"Are you sick?" Cam inquired.

"Do you ever stop?" Videsse snapped. She climbed to the pilot seat and slumped back as if she could sleep for forty years. She took four deep breaths, and might have passed out if it was not for Cam who had climbed to the cockpit and was looking at her from the steps.

"Maybe you need to take it easy for a while. Take a nap or something."

"Yeah," she shot a sarcastic glare at him that had all of the heat of a laser blast with none of its effect. Then, leaning forward she switched on _Slave-1_ and linked her wrist console to the display.

Nolan's location lit with a blinking blue dot in the middle of the map of Adascopolis. "He's still at the diamond guild," Videsse uttered with a tired exhale. "We'll need to watch him for a bit."

She replaced her helmet under her seat, and quite accidentally her fingers tapped on the glass of the whiskey bottle. Without thinking, her hand was around it and it was in her lap. She looked down as if surprised to see it there. Her shaking hands held it up so that the amber liquid refracted the natural light from the canopy window. Icteric lines of light undulated over her face as she looked to the sky through the whiskey bottle. Videsse was underwater. She just began to realize what was happening to her.

"If I just take a sip of you I'll probably be fine." She swirled the liquid into a whirlpool, watching it climb the sides in its vortex, then gently sink back to the bottom. "Just a capful, and I'll be better . . . almost immediately, I think. Just in a minute or two . . . maybe."

Cam was still watching her. "Did that make you sick or something?" He was confused.

Videsse's face transformed from imploring to hard as if a shadow from a cloud above her had passed over the canopy. Her grip tightened around the bottle. "Yes," she said with gritted teeth. "Yes, it did." She threw the bottle back under her seat, but it did not break.

"Shut up, Cam!"

Cam straightened up and cocked his head like a furry ysalmir. "I didn't say anything."

Videsse shot a glance at him, then eased and put her head back on the seat.

"My ship is here," she returned to the subject of her goal. "I saw the hilt of that man's saber under his vest. He's the one that stole my ship."

"He's the same one that captured me too," Cam added.

"We just need to watch where he goes."

Cam put his hand on Videsse's shoulder. She winced as if it had been a knife.

"Dess, I can do that," he offered. "You need to take a nap."

Videsse could not argue with that, but she wanted to. "You watch the schematics? We'll be tracking one of those biting midges if I let you do that."

"How do you think I know that Nolan was the one that captured me?"

"I don't know and don't care," Videsse snapped.

"Right," Cam rebutted. "I'm better at bounty hunting than you know. I can watch the tracker."

Videsse shook her head. "Fine," she pretended to be upset. "I'm just gonna lie flat in the cargo bay for a few minutes. If you lose my ship, I'll make you regret it."

"Yeah," Cam replied. "I know."

Videsse's fell deeply into a dream, almost as soon as her body laid down. She sank into it, drifting further from the surface of consciousness. Her physical body held its breath as long as it could, before breathing in the sleep and darkness. A pale light of a bright distant star appeared and flickered above her in the waves of her dream.

She heard voices, muffled and distant, then nearer, as if they were floating on the surface of her dream and drifting closer.

"_She's not like us, Boba . . . I would have given up. You would have gone after the ship."_

"_She _is _going after the ship."_

"_Is that what you think?"_

Videsse tried to move her arms under the water in an attempt to swim to the surface, but her arms felt weighted as if she was fighting the dead gears of her armor. She looked at her arms in the dark light, but there was no armor. They were naked and glowed in the undulating light. She fought to kick her legs, but they felt the same resistance. Her unconscious form writhed and made no progress toward the surface, only pivoting the oily mirk.

"_Then what is she searching for?"_

"_She won't even let herself know what she is really looking for."_

Videsse started to hold her breath again, as one does in dreams like this, forgetting that she was able to breathe just a moment earlier. Her panic rose, as she felt suffocated by the viscous dream she was enveloped in, a dream that seemed to thicken every second.

"Soon, I'll be frozen," she thought to herself.

The dream fluid darkened to a deepening grey-brown and grew more opaque by the moment. A few flickering particulates floated around her before slowing to a settled placement.

"Carbonate," Videsse feared. "I can't get out." She remembered the beautiful and tragic face of the frozen Twi'lek she had seen an age ago in the Keeper's hold; the woman Twi'lek was so calm and courageous. Would she be like that, she had thought that day. Now, she opened her mouth to cry out, but her words were too heavy, and would not escape. The dark fluid filled her mouth, bitter and thick and cold.

"_What are you searching for, Patch?" _the male voice repeated.

Videsse's arms set in place, her legs, her body, frozen and enveloped in the blackening cast. She fought, and although her muscles tensed and quivered, there was not even a millimeter of movement of her limbs. Her heart broke, and if she could, her chest would heave and tears would flow, but now she was frozen. If only she could cry out. If only she could speak into the dark, and someone would hear her, hear her story, her cry for help.

"What will happen to him," she thought, "if I am frozen here?"

"Peezee," her weak voice spoke aloud.

Cam's blue hands shook her. "Dess, wake up. Wake up."

Videsse was breathing hard, her chest heaving like a steam vent on a podracer.

"I found where Nolan is hiding your ship." His jostling became more violent, and painful. Just a touch was becoming more difficult to endure.

"Ship?" Videsse asked, disorientated and wiping her forehead. It was still drenched in sweat. She threw her arm across her body to push away the child.

"Here." Cam stepped back and tossed her a ration pack of fluid. "I think you need this, maybe a dozen. Then, let's check out the tracker."

Videsse looked around the cargo bay, still trying to get her bearings. Her hands were still were shaking, her stomach still nauseated and the thought of drinking the fluid ration was repulsive. Her leg still ached, but at least there were no phantom eskrats and humanoids running around, not currently anyway.

Wrappers of nutro-sticks were strewn across the floor, evidence that Cam had raided the ration stores.

Videsse did not care. What was she going to do with the rations anyway? Certainly, not eat them. She took a few sips of the fluid ration, realizing that Cam was right-she did need it. The room-temperature water, felt like ice as it trickled down her throat, so apparently frigid that it was like fire and burned as it went down. Her stomach, at the moment the water entered its lumen, had instantly started to contract in an attempt to expel it. She could only bear a few painful and abhorrent milliliters before abandoning the attempt.

"What did you find?" she asked with a dry and cracked voice and took a few mouthed breaths, blowing out slowly.

"The mountains, about fifty kilometers north of here. Look," Cam answered and climbed to the pilot's chair.

Videsse turned to her side and stood up, slowly defying gravity. She climbed the ladder, hand over hand and foot over foot, panting heavily, yet still arriving.

"Yeah," she exhaled. "Show me."

Cam eagerly pointed to the holographic map at blue mountains north of Adascopolis. A blue blinking light flashed from the side of one of the taller mountains.

"He went there a few hours ago and stayed there. He hasn't traveled much, since."

"Hours ago? How long was I out?" Videsse asked.

"Dunno, maybe six hours," Cam said and shook his shoulders. He materialized another Nutro stick as if from a phantom void and took a bite.

Videsse looked surprised, then shook her head. "Fine, let's go there."

"You up for it? You don't look any better than when you went down," Cam inquired, "maybe, even worse."

"Get outta my seat," she barked.

Cam complied. "Sure, but the way you look. . . well, I've got a bad feeling about this."

"Shut up, Cam." Videsse slunk into her seat. She flipped on the engines, and then the cloaking device.

"Here goes nothin'."


	28. Episode X Cam's First Job

The identified blue mountain rose higher than the neighboring peaks, although the valleys between it and its brother mountains were shallow; and shallower than the true base because the valleys were filled with creeping glaciers.

The cloaked _Slave-1_ circled the sleeping mountain a few times so Videsse could assess the potential entry and exit points. Outside, the mountain was dead with no organic activity, animal or Arkanian. The winds blew between the mountains and shoved Videsse's ship in unexpected directions. Videsse gripped the control arm and stubbornly focused through her own physical state to keep the ship relatively steady. Even so, Cam cried out a few times when the turbulence juggled the ship and dropped it a handful of meters.

The mountain had five small landing pads lipped out from five gaping entryways on the south-side. On each rested two or three _Needle-class _starfighters, the same model she had encountered in the exosphere. Snow had settled on half of the snub fighters. In addition to the five landing pads, there was a large flat elliptical expanse at the bottom. It was further down the body of the ridge, almost in the valley where the biting wind held its breath. It was obviously and meticulously maintained, evident by the lack of ice. Seventy meters was its long axis, and sixty its short axis.

The ground of this expanse was fashioned with an immense mosaic of grey, blue, black and yellow stones, the largest stones being the size of _Slave-1_, and its smallest the size of an astromech droid. A black ringed border edged the entire oval, and unfamiliar blue glyphs were etched into it. Along the long axis, there were arranged three black circles, four meters wide consisting of one flat, glassy, black, obsidian stone each. Two were found at the elliptical foci at the western and eastern sides, and the third was positioned in the center. From the center circle, a yellow sigmoid arc curved, the northern arm curving to the west, and the southern arm to the east before becoming one with the dark-stoned border. Also from the axis of the center circle, two yellow stoned lined triangles extended to the tangents of the eastern and western circles.

All of this religiously patterned work was relatively uninteresting to Videsse, who had all of her attention fixated on another point, for sitting next to the eastern black circle was an _SS-64_ starship, black, dented, beaten, and worn. Its dorsal stabilizers that supported its distal sub-light engines, gave the ship a T-shaped appearance when seen from the front. From above, the cranial bulging cockpit with a caudal hyperdrive engine created a distinct cross-shaped form. The ship, like everything else, seemed lifeless, and the blue-white light of the ice valley made it look grey with anemia; ironically for its name, this sleeping ship was the _Vigilance_.

It did not sit alone. Arranged around the same east circle were five waste-high pedestals, four of them had indistinct items floating magnetically above them. Across from the _Vigilance_, a tired curved _Razalon FC-20_ speeder-bike sat.

Videsse stared at her familiar ship with glassy and shaky eyes. Had it only been eight days since Videsse had last seen the _Vigilance_? It seemed to her like a decade ago. Everything seemed like a decade ago. How long had it been since she had last seen Boba, her mother, their graves, Donal, PZ-85? A pain in her chest sharpened beyond the simple explanation of alcohol withdrawal and she suddenly desired to put her helmet on and so she did. The vocalizer activated, making her breathing obvious and wet.

"That's your ship?" Cam asked, who like a phantom, always appeared behind Videsse's chair without her awareness.

Videsse did not answer with words, and heaved a spurious cough as she nodded.

"Then it's easy. We just drop down, hop in and get out of here. Just, how do we get both ships out of here?"

"_Raider_ will take _Slave-1 _home." Videsse's voice was weak and cracked when she said the word _home_. She cleared her throat. "But we need to land in the valley."

"What?" Cam objected. "This is an easy steal. Just drop'n go'n get out before they even know what happened. Use your cloak, for star's sake. You couldn't ask for a better target. If I could pilot, I could do it by myself, no problem." Cam trained a look at Videsse, the most incredulous look that he had ever dared to give her.

Videsse did not turn her head to him to see the look, but she figured it was present. She sat as still as if she was made of ice herself. "There's something else."

"Something else?"

"I need to go inside the mountain." Videsse stretched her fingers, then tried to wipe her nose through her helmet, with a ridiculous and awkward result. She shook her head in embarrassment and replaced her trembling hand on the control arm. "There's just something else they stole from me. Something I need to see-eh, do-eh, there's no arguin' about it," she sniffed, and then coughed again as a distraction.

Cam rolled his eyes and wiped his tangled mousy hair from this brow. "Whatever," he said mimicking Videsse's usual comment, climbed back to the passenger seat, and then called out as a thought came to his mind. "For all the effort to get this ship, you seem not to care that you may lose it again. You may be a good bounty hunter. But, I'm a better thief."

Videsse landed _Slave-1_, in the valley around the perimeter of the mountain, hidden from the view of the landing platforms. It was a frigid hike, and easier for the light-weighted Cam than Videsse, since he could more easily walk on the top of the icy snow, but Videsse's feet kept breaking through the crusted surface with every step. Still, it only took them three-quarters of an hour to trek around and up the slope to the leveled mosaic.

The platform was unoccupied, however, Videsse and Cam approached the ship with the same caution as hunted prey. The air was surprisingly still in the valley, the ice sieging every sound making their footsteps into muted staccato pats. It was an unnatural silence, final in its nihility, like death. The cold, the darts of the ice, permeated through Videsse's heating coils, like arrows over a wall, and found their shafts buried deep in her core. If she was not already trembling, she would have started. Cam, in contrast, was trembling anew, now that the heavy marching through the snow had ceased. His teeth chattered like war drums keeping the siege of the frigid air at bay.

Videsse advanced toward her ship silently, cautiously. She trailed her shaking hand carefully over the side of the ship's left sublight engine, then its main body, like she was approaching a timid flying Brezak, preparing to mount it. There was a desire to talk softly to it, but Videsse held her tongue, recognizing the uselessness of the action. Instead, she allowed her fingers to trail over the dents and scratch some of the grey carbon scaring off with a sharp edge of her gauntlet. She came to the port door and opened it with her wrist console, even though she could have used the external datapad on the body of this ship.

Unseen ice in the door seam cracked as the door slid forward, and shavings of ice dropped from above, clicking as they fell to the ground just inside of the aft passenger cabin. Videsse stepped in, cracking the delicate ice under her boots. Cam followed automatically. She kept the door open. The passenger cabin was comprised of two wall-mounted couches on the aft and starboard walls and a secured table between them, all of which could be converted into beds for sleeping quarters. Videsse lit her helmet light, turned left, and poked her head through a narrow door to the forward cargo hold. It was empty. She was looking for something, someone.

After her brief investigation was complete, she climbed a ladder on the bulwark that separated the cargo and passenger holds and ascended to the cockpit. Cam started to climb behind her when he heard the control panel start up, and faced Videsse's feet already descending the ladder. He leapt off the ladder and back-stepped to the starboard bench giving her a wide berth.

Videsse spun around and removed her left pistol. She checked the cartridges.

"You ready for your first bounty job?" she questioned.

Cam shook his head in surprise, then stepped forward puffing his chest. "You bet!"

Videsse nodded. "Stay here, and shoot anything that tries to get on this ship while I'm gone."

Cam's face fell. "Stay here? Are you serious?"

"What? You worried about missing the action?" Videsse replied.

"No... I'm worried you won't come back, and I'll freeze to death waiting for you."

Videsse smiled behind her helmet. It would have been the same thing she would have worried about. "Never mind that. I turned the climate regulator on. You'll die for lack of food first."

Cam scowled at her.

"Here," Videsse stepped to his side and held out the pistol for him to take. "You ever handle one of these."

Cam shook his head but grabbed the handle eagerly with his left hand. Videsse did not let go of the blaster's muzzle.

"Don't put your finger on the trigger until you're ready to fire." She grabbed his right hand and put it under the handle. "Straighten your arms. Lock your elbows. It'll kick. Let your shoulders take the kickback." She moved behind him and aimed the barrel through the open door. She moved his grip so the handle wedged itself into the angle of his thumb and palm. "That'll give you better control." She pointed to a side latch on the barrel. "That's the safety. It's on. Take it off only if you hear someone opening the door. Now aim. Keep both eyes open and look down the barrel, lining up the rear and front sights Keep your arms straight. Elbows locked, I said. When you want to shoot, _squeeze_ the trigger, don't pull it or you'll miss. Like this." She placed her hands over his and squeezed to show him. He could feel her whole body trembling as she wrapped her arms around him. "Got it?"

Cam nodded. "Yeah, I got it." His voice was heavy with concern.

"Now take the safety off. Yes, like that. And fire at the mountain across the way. Pick a spot and squeeze. What're you aimin' at?"

"That half-covered boulder."

Videsse saw it and nodded. "Okay. Any time."

The blaster kicked causing Cam's elbows to buckle. Cam had kept his eyes open, but did not see the red flash when fired. However, there was a small ice hole on the opposite mountain ten degrees below the boulder.

"Hmm. Not good, but what can ya' expect. It'll do. Now, set the safety again. Good. There, now you got the same instruction, I got when first learnin' to shoot, only I was younger-a bit younger."

Cam lifted the gun, and held it upright, resting his lips on the warm muzzle as it aimed at the ceiling.

Videsse winced and pushed the gun down, back at the open door. "That's a little close to your face. Never aim that at anything you don't want dead. Even if the safety's on."

Cam assented then asked with more concern than Videsse was comfortable with, "Are you going to be okay in there?"

Videsse snapped away from him and rubbed her neck. "Yeah." She activated her cloak. "They won't even know I'm there."

Cam looked at her invisible form. "But, I can still kinda see you, like looking through water."

"Yeah, well. If they aren't _tryin'_ to see me, they won't think anything of it. It's how these things work. You, just guard the ship and I'll be back soon." She stepped toward the door, her footsteps exceedingly uneven now that the cloak inactivated the brace.

She exited the ship and then shut the door. As it closed, she was quick to throw one more comment. "Just make sure it ain't me before you shoot anyone."


	29. Episode X The Corridor and the Voices

Videsse limped past the pedestals on the platform and made a brief inventory as was her habit in all situations (she was still and always a bounty hunter). _Perhaps the items would be valuable enough to walk off with when leaving_, she thought. Upon a brief examination, they did not seem to be. There was a black, half-melted helmet with a vented faceplate.

_Worthless, _Videsse thought.

A singed grey cloak floated above the next pedestal, undulating as if in churning water, making it look like a Karkarias jellyfish. _Also worthless._ Next, there was a red pyramidal object with the same glyphs that edged the platform's perimeter. Videsse removed it from the pedestal. It was heavier than she expected and though she found it interesting, she was unsure of its value. She restored it into its magnetic cylinder. After that, a silver and black, angled hilt of a lightsaber rotated in the air. Videsse shrugged, again, not interested. The final pedestal sat empty. Lastly, she walked past the _Razalon_ speeder, figuring it was at least seventy years old. _Perhaps some collectors would be interested_, she thought but recognized that it would be too difficult to escape with after she had found her PZ-85 droid-if she found him.

Videsse traversed the rest of the mosaiced platform, appearing like a ghostly apparition in the late afternoon mountain shadow. She lurched toward the door, an undead ghost venturing to interact with the physical world. The door was shut, and a control panel was positioned waist high on the right side. Videsse removed one of her vibroblades to pry the panel loose in order to hotwire it open. Her invisible vibroblade scraped the panel. It buzzed as it contacted the metal plate and fell out of the joints as her shaking hand tried to work it in. Videsse, trying to stabilize the quivering blade, grabbed it with both vaporous hands, but was finding it nauseating to concentrate so hard on keeping her hand steady in the surgical procedure. Instead, she decided to just hit the "open" thumb pad, mostly in desperation and without hope. However, it worked.

"Huh," she whispered to herself, surprised and frustrated that she had not tried the simplest action first. She gritted her teeth in resentment. It was difficult to think logically, swimming in the waves of headaches, nausea, and trembling; yet, she pushed through those waves and entered. The blade returned to her boot sheath.

A dim yellow light awoke inside the door, illuminating only a few meters of a corridor. The path led into a black void with no observable end. Videsse stepped forward as the door shut behind her, unintentionally (or intentionally) preventing her retreat.

Videsse stood for a moment in a cone of jaundice light. The walls were decorated with typical Arkanian art, though this seemed darker and more religious. Men and women sat by firesides, black, grey, yellow, and orange. Yet, behind each brushstroke fireside, was another creature, a smoky and black creature, with clawed wings and fell red eyes. Sometimes it stood as a man with a pale face and red lines over its red eyes, other times it flew above in the smoke, and still, another crouched in the distance as if barred from the light, its claws grasping and reaching for the unsuspecting fireside listeners.

Videsse took note, and shuddered at the imagery, then looked reticently into the darkness ahead. An eerie breeze blew from the corridor and swirled the dust particles at the edge of the light, like two black wings swinging wide. It was haunting, and though she did not believe in the supernatural, she found it unsettling. She moved on into the corridor. Heat-sensor lights awoke as she progressed to guide her way, and died as she passed by. Walking only in a narrow sphere of light, she strained uselessly to see the end of the hall before her and when she looked back, the door behind had vanished in the darkness.

She heard scurrying behind her and thought she could see shadows running from the icteric light, but was never able to catch any with her darting eyes.

Repeated in the images on the wall art, the winged demon crouched and hunted and flew above each of the fireside gatherers. The creature grew in every scene as she progressed. Was it above her, behind her, in front of her? The wind blew again, and again the dust wings swelled open to receive her.

Videsse continued with each laborious limping step, pushing through the pain in her leg, twenty meters at least, she estimated. That is when she heard something. A whisper, a trick of her mind, an assault of her ears on her will. What it was and what it said, she could not make it out. However, she thought she knew what was intended; a desire, a questioning. Her desperately ill mind took advantage of the dark and the shadows, and would use this crack in her defenses to drive her back to the whiskey, she figured.

She halted and whipped around in each direction, knowing that phantom images were running away from her gaze at every turn. It was the withdrawal, she told herself. She knew it, but she could not shake the frightening alternative, however ridiculous. This was not the huffing and impervious Rook Na hunting her in the dark. Something like that she could study and predict. It could breathe, it could bleed, it could fall. These apparitions, however, she could not touch. They did not breathe. Did they actually do anything, these mental hiccoughs of the brain?

Videsse tried to walk faster, shunning stealth, and biting her lip at the pain in her scarred leg. Her footsteps were loud and echoed in the corridor, more distantly from behind letting her know that she was close to the end. The hall led to a small elliptical chamber, with the same mosaic pattern on the floor that she had observed outside-an oval, three circles, the sigmoid arc. There was a door opposite her. On the left wall was a painting of the dreadful wraith.

It was tall and life-sized, standing a meter taller than any person with its head looking down at the observer. Its eyes were red, with sharp scarlet lines bisecting each eye and traversing its smooth-skinned forehead down the sides of its face. The creature grimaced, displaying an even row of sharp white teeth, greedy and hungry. Its black body was muscular and unusually humanoid with a chest, abdomen, and muscle-toned legs. However, unlike a human, the legs ended with three-toed clawed feet, and its arms were the savage wings that she had already observed.

Under its clawed feet, and sickled wings were two other beings. Beneath its left foot laid an old man, white with age, supine, blood dripping from his mouth, his head turned back unnaturally in death. He was clothed in a grey cloak, Arkanian fire and ice etched into its trim. Beneath the creature's opposite right claw laid a prone woman, green-haired and clothed in white. She also, was bloody, her head lying flat in death, like the man.

Videsse thought the artwork was grotesque, and she shuddered as she studied it before turning to the opposite wall. The right wall's mural was more pleasant to the eye and less ominous. Three beings stood, two of them were obviously the same man and woman from the first mural. The old man stood above, his face stern and his left hand upright, palm out. Beneath him and to his right, Videsse's left, the woman stood. A squat winged creature, a convor, with green plumage and large emerald eyes sat on the woman's right shoulder. The woman's left hand pointed across her to her right with her palm facing away.

Videsse then directed her attention to the old man's left side where another figure stood. This figure was clothed in black and his left hand was clenched in a fist pointing the opposite direction from the woman. He was bald and white, and his eyes were scarlet red. Red lines marked his face, bisecting his eyes exactly like the winged creature on the opposing mural. Videsse turned to look at the creature, though every part of her resisted it. It was obvious, these two beings were related, if not the same. Videsse then noticed that the claw of the creature's left wing was clenched in a fist, exactly like the man.

_They are the same_, Videsse thought, being careful not to talk aloud, not knowing if anyone could hear her.

She looked back at the three on the right wall. _Was it a father, a daughter, and a son_, she questioned herself, _a family?_

"He did not need them. He needed no one, nothing."

Videsse jumped. It was an audible voice; exactly like her own voice. _Did I speak out loud_, Videsse asked herself silently. _You must be more careful. _

However, the statement was not lost on her. She saw it, the family. She closed her eyes and inhaled, holding her breath for a long moment. She forced herself to gaze at the winged creature.

He was smiling, and alone. He was fierce, and filled with malice and death. Videsse trembled, probably the withdrawal we must assume. Or did she see something in that creature, a reflection perhaps?

Videsse shook her head, and almost voiced the word, _whatever_. She turned to the door and pressed the control pad for it to open, having learned from the first door. It opened with an audible gasp. She suddenly reasoned with herself. _If the door was closed, where did the wind gusts come from in the corridor? Had the door opened? _

She looked up to see if there were climate vents near the domed light. There were none. _Someone must have come through this door and exited to make the two gusts. That was it_, she reasoned. _Be careful. Someone is in the next room. _ She did not consider that if someone had entered, the sensor lights had not been activated. Certainly, it must have been a malfunction.


	30. Episode X Wanderings in the Dark

There was someone in the next room, four in fact, who could barely be seen in the dark twilit room. Their forms were still, and statuesque, as they stood in a circle with their heads down in a trance, motionless and unliving.

Videsse froze, holding her breath. The acolyte forms were only ten meters in front of her and did not appear to move, except for the wisps of their cloaks that were probably just the dim light playing tricks on Videsse's already deceitful eyes. The door behind her slid closed with a relatively deafening grind. Videsse raised her shoulders and lowered her head at the sound. Even though it was the same as when the door opened, now it seemed unbearable. The acolytes did not move, as if deaf and blind and rooted to the ground. Without another thought, the cloaked Videsse leapt to her right into a recess where there was a curving stairway climbing upward in the mountain rock.

Videsse peeked beyond the corner wall of the stairway, still holding her breath and clenching her fists. She pinched her hands between her knees in case her tremors inadvertently made audible scratches against the grey stone wall. She exhaled slowly and tremorously as she attempted another controlled breath.

The persons were gathered in the center of an expansive room that was fifteen meters tall with a distant and darkened ceiling that flickered with studded, punctate crystals. These crystals that glowed like stars, made it appear like one was standing outside on a clear night.

At another time, we might lie on our backs and chase the crystalline stars with our eyes, wondering why they had come to be, and why we naturally compared them to the cosmos. Now, however, these acolytes did not look at them. The crystals were not Arkanian diamonds, though they could have been confused for them easily to an untrained eye. They actually glowed on their own, not simply refracting light as diamonds do. This gave the room a natural, and yet eerie atmosphere, with fluxes of black specters seeming to fly about the room. As I had stated earlier in this account, this was a simple trick of the mind on the eyes common in dim light, of course; the same trick we had seen at the grave of Boba and Terrah, we can assume.

The four people, two men and two women were clothed in black robes and their heads were hooded. Their sexes could only be determined due to the more feminine style of the two robes, which were shaped with a high galactic waistline typical for females. They stood facing each other on the edges of another black circle. As their faces were directed downward at the center they mumbled in accord a repeated Arkanian phrase, harsh and yet melodic. They were real, and they were alive.

Videsse's entry did not seem to disturb them in the slightest, but she was not going to test it. After one last observation-that she saw another mirrored stairway and door on the opposite wall beyond the acolytes-she decided to ascend. The acolytes were oblivious.

Videsse took each step with extreme attention. Her left leg spasmed in pain, but she braced it with a tight grip. She lurched to look behind multiple times, thinking that she had heard one of the acolytes ascending the black stairway behind her, but there was nothing, nothing evident for our eyes to see. Nothing corporeal, I should say.

With labor she eventually climbed the twenty steps to the next level's door. Before opening the door, she fell back against the wall and disabled the cloak so she could check her power cell reserves. They were low, ten percent. The power cell was removed and placed in her waist pouch, and a new one replaced it. Four were left. She reactivated the cloak, and opened the door, more cautiously this time.

If only she could find a display console where she could search for droid power docks, she hoped. It was half of a hope, for she knew it would be programmed in Arkanian, and she was prepared for it to be unfruitful.

The current floor looked, to her, as if it was a library. It consisted of a long hallway that was cut deep into the heart of the mountain, with at least thirty large round rooms on either side. Each recess was lined with books and scrolls, ancient and frail. Like the lower level, it was oddly dim, the acolytes apparently preferring the darkness. For this reason, Videsse's cloak worked well, her vapor lines barely visible. Although, that was no excuse for indiscretion.

This level, like the previous one, was occupied with undistracted acolytes. They walked like ghosts, among the archives, some reading, others associating in their unrecognizable language, and others strangely standing still and staring blankly in the darkness as if waiting to catch a glimpse of someone or something. These people were supremely odd to our heroine. Videsse slipped into recesses to let some pass occasionally.

Nevertheless, she continued down the hall cautiously and irregularly. To her satisfaction, halfway down the hall, a semi-circular display console rested with no one occupying it. She could see acolytes in the distance on either side, black shadows gliding in the icteric light. Her hands quickly moved through the digital display, trying icons that were labeled with unfamiliar Arkanian glyphs. It took her a minute or two, but eventually, a schematic of the compound lit the screen. The architecture implied their functions since the labels did not help. Levels above her, it appeared, were more archives and then living quarters. Above that, she located what she was looking for ship docks, generators, storages, and then droid docks.

"Scoundrel's luck," Videsse said to herself, then checked herself, shaking her head at the accidental slip. However the accident, it was understandable. She had seen something on the schematics, something that watered a seed of hope within her, a seed that had seemed to die months ago. Did the dark brown seed crack just a hair? Or has it already been cracking; a cotyledon of hope just learning to stretch its delicate stem toward the light? What water dripped on the scorched ground feeding the dead seed? What did she see?

One of the droid docks was a picture of a PZ droid.


	31. Episode X The Best Laid Plans

Multiple floor levels later, and one less fuel cell (three cells were left), Videsse found herself at the mechanic and engineer level. Her left leg burned as if on fire, her brain throbbed, and sweat permeated her synthetic under armor and tunic. The withdrawal that had started that morning continued to wax within her. Even so, remarkably, she pushed to concentrate through these distractions.

This level was brightly lit, in contrast with the others, making the vapor lines of her cloak more visible, and therefore Videsse became more prudent with her movements. The acolytes on this level were not clad in the dark robes she had seen on the worship levels, and many donned blasters at their sides. They wore obvious work clothes; vests with pockets, and tight-fitting, organic shirts and leggings; probably made from the hair of the lago creatures she had seen outside of Adascopolis. Their orange faces were uncovered and their white-haired heads unhooded. Many were female, but more were male, and each appeared to have a designated job which made the level busy, but not crowded. Hence, Videsse dodged walking acolytes every minute or two, as she ducked into recesses and hallways.

The acolytes worked on droids, ships, storage facilities, holo stations, and anything else that could be maintained. They were a diligent people and had a severe devotion for service to the whole. It was a community; a family devoted. This was true of most Arkanians in whatever they found fellowship over; only here, their common thread was devotion to their supposed _Dark Master_, the one Nolan had said was coming. They spoke to each other in unemotional tones, and occasionally one would help another. To Videsse it seemed almost unnatural, and yet it _was_ completely natural. Videsse cringed.

It was not far, yet it was long before Videsse found herself at a ship hangar, attached to one of the landing platforms she had seen on her initial approach with _Slave-1_. Two _Needle-class_ snubs were in stages of repair and filled the hangar. A few droids and one Arkanian diligently worked on each ship, sparks raining from both like white cascades as droids soldered above. The burning metal fumes permeated the air and singed the nostrils.

Beyond the ships on the far wall were six droid docking stations, where three droids slept and recharged. One of them was a PZ droid, grey, carbon-scarred, and dented. The same grey, carbon-scarred, dented plating of Terrah's droid, PZ-85. Videsse shook her head and bit her lip when seeing him across from her. She wanted to run to him, turn him on, and remember with him the things that she had been trying to forget; the great paradox of our heroine.

What else could she have felt at that moment? She would never admit to you or me. We could assume there was regret, hope, guilt, fear, and possibly more, if we were to assume she was like you and I. But even if her cloak was not activated, we would only observe a stone statue, blue-lit unliving eyes, and an armored form, incapable of displaying emotion. Videsse's heart was safely hidden in cloak and armor, and smoke when needed, and even whiskey up until forty-eight hours ago. She was well trained, and Boba might have shown his pride in her if he had not been hidden behind his own screens in life; some that had been removed in the end, and others that were never discarded. Even now he still hides behind the adamant veil of death.

What was our heroine thinking as she stared at the droid, twenty meters away, the _Needle-class_ ships her only obstacle? Would she defend her foolhardy decision to find the droid? Would she explain that she was well aware of her current disability, physically and mentally? That though she knew she could not hope to aim a blaster with a steady hand, nor stare down its sight with her blurry and hallucinating vision, nor run on her stabbing leg; that even through these, she had a plan. Would she explain that she knew it was stupid for her to try and save PZ-85, and even that plan was clouded with the lack of whiskey and a colossal headache? Yes, she knew all these things, but she also knew something else. PZ-85 was no ordinary protocol droid. His protocol programming had been intentionally removed by Boba Fett and replaced with assault programming. He was deadly with a weapon, if only one could be given to him and his restraining bolt removed. Was that the plan, Videsse? Of course, it was; to hide in cloak and shadow, to rescue her droid, and together detonate and shoot their way out. And does our heroine's plan surprise you? In a way, I hope it does not, or I have, thus far, misrepresented her to my shame. Videsse has always been one to make a grand exit. However, some part of her plan may surprise us, and even our heroine was surprised, and also disgusted. That she desired and needed to save her mother's droid was an impulse she would not even admit to herself from the very moment PZ-85 had been kidnapped. No matter the façade, to us and to herself, the heart was one thing that could not be hidden forever. Boba learned it, Terrah learned it, and now, Videsse did as well, here at this moment when she would run to the last remnant of her mother and father. Together, her mother's droid, her father's programing, and Videsse would fight their way out.

Did Videsse actually whisper something to herself? Of course, she did not. It was just our ears playing tricks on our minds.

What was not a trick of the ears was the punctuated shout behind Videsse, the shout of a child, and then a blaster shot.

An Arkanian growl followed, and then the child again. "Let me go!" It was an unwelcome and familiar voice.

Videsse winced and hoped beyond reason that she was simply having an auditory hallucination. Still, a fire of anger erupted within her. This could not be Cam, ruining her plans and endangering himself, the droid, and worst of all, Videsse.

"You speak Basic," an Arkanian voice stated in Basic, loudly but unemotionally. "Trying to steal my blaster?"

That was it. It was real. Videsse swore under her breath, looked across the maintenance deck to her droid. Would she abandon the droid, or abandon Cam? The choice was before her, and she had half a second to make the decision, for Cam was in immediate risk, and the maintenance deck would be soon swarming with acolytes at the alarm-the alarm that just was activated.

If she could turn herself into an actual dark star and consume the entire room in her anger, she would have gladly; that a dark nebulous storm could escape from her and devour the ships, the droids, the very floor itself in a torrent of shrapnel and debris, consuming all life and existence forever into particulate dust. She shook as if the storm was about to escape; this time not in alcohol withdrawal, but in fury, and a wrathful guttural growl escaped her core. Videsse did not worry about silence now.

"Fine!" she exclaimed, deactivating her cloak so that her leg brace would function, and turned toward the voice of the angry acolyte. Her one blaster found her right hand. The other hand dropped a smoke grenade behind her which cracked in and explosion, the resulting billowing cloud obscuring the view from those working on the ships. She ran toward Cam, surprisingly without tremors.

"I recognize you," the acolyte stated in the distance. "You are that slave from Nar Shaddaa."

The voice came from just around a corner, the corner that Videsse was already rounding.

"If he's here," a second acolyte continued, "then that bounty hunter is here as well."

"You got that right," Videsse said from three meters behind him, her shaking blaster aimed at one of them; the one without Cam.

That acolyte was a tall, almost red-skinned male, with a shaved head. He was standing by the holo wall display and had activated the alarm. His recognition of Videsse's presence was brief, as all his recognition was lost in the red fury of Videsse's death. Four bolts flew by his head, but one landed, and so did his lifeless body. She was lucky to hit him, as she was as unlikely to hit anything smaller than the broad side of a bantha with her quivering aim.

The other acolyte held Cam's confiscated blaster in his right hand, and had Cam wrapped against him with his left arm. He looked up in surprise when his comrade collapsed. The captor's torso rocked as Cam writhed and tried to free himself. Videsse could not make a reliable shot, not in her current state. She moved her left hand to the butt of the gun to stabilize her shaking grip.

The acolyte snapped the blaster up toward Videsse, but before he could fire, Cam's teeth sank deep into the carpal joint of the restraining hand.

He screamed out and threw the kid against the wall reflexively, his chest exposed, and five blaster bolts ripped through him in an instant. Five others missed.

New shouts resounded from all directions from the few that were in the corridor and unseen others. Even in the unfamiliar language, Videsse knew what they were shouting. "Someone is here!" "Two of our own are dead!" "Get here quick!" The two acolytes already in the hall grabbed their blasters as further footsteps pounded the ground, increasing in their decibels. She grabbed the blaster out of the dead man's hand, holstered it, dropped another smoke grenade at her feet, and reactivated her cloak.

Cam rose and flattened his back against the wall, sheepishly. "I'm sorry, Dess."

"Shut Up!" There was no hint of affection. The word was meant to be another red blaster bolt directed precisely at Cam's heart. If it could have killed him, Videsse would have been satisfied.

Her smoke screen flashed with a blood red light as the acolytes started to fire into it from both directions.

Videsse wonder, like we would, how the acolytes might have been caught in their own crossfire.

A few shots reflected off of her shielded armor.

Videsse was afraid.

"Sod it!" she shouted, knowing that she was lucky. Her armor would deflect glancing rounds but not direct hits. She threw a dozen shots down the hallway that she had not come from, and rolled a physical charge the opposite direction. Videsse knew acutely what a detonation would do in the tight space, but there was no other choice.

Half a second later, the hallway surged with the explosion from the grenade, a pressure wave throwing Videsse down like a brick wall, and blowing her smokescreen down the corridor. She collapsed on the ground, her cloak lines exposed. Behind her, the roof of the hallway fell in peices, and the walls pushed out. There were three acolytes that had perished in the explosion, but to look at the debris left there was no evidence that the men had ever existed.

Videsse stiffly raised her left leg with help from her left arm. She gasped heavily and winced. She kept her right hand aimed down the intact corridor as the smoke receded before her and exposed five acolytes ten meters away, eace raising a blaster. Foremost of them, was the black-cloaked Nolan. No mask covered his face, and the red, cross-bladed lightsaber pulsated at his side.

Videsse did not take a fraction of a second before a trill of her red blaster fire flashed in his direction. It seemed to her that the laser lines seemed to move through a gel as they advanced toward them, and then fizzled into blue ripples just before striking them. It was a blaster shield; one of the acolytes balanced its portable generator on the floor behind them.

Without thinking, Videsse activated and threw another grenade. It arced toward them, clanked as it bounced once, and then froze mid-air as if an invisible hand had caught it. Videsse stepped back in a stumble, and her mouth dropped behind her helmet. Nolan's hand stretched forward, his fingers spread out and tense.

"What the-"

The grenade erupted, except this time the explosion did not destroy the corridor, but seemed to be contained within an invisible sphere. Fire and smoke expanded and swirled like a small gas planet before Nolan relaxed his fingers. The sphere melted in smoke that dissipated and vanished, small pieces of shrapnel falling like rain from a storm cloud and tinking on the stone ground beneath it.

Videsse shook her head in disbelief, half thinking it was another hallucination, her blaster half lowered.

Nolan then changed the position of his hand into a half claw, as if he was trying to grab some invisible object.

Videsse coughed, the typical clearing of her throat when she felt her throat tighten because of emotion. Was that it, now?

A wicked smile crossed Nolan's face and he stepped forward, turning his menacing grip.

Videsse shook her head, straightened her shoulders and suppressed her fear. "So," she called out, feigning an arrogant demeanor. "Are you going to shoot me or what?" She turned off her cloak, recognizing it was useless at this point. Her black form materialized in an electric net of sparks.

Nolan's face became stern, almost surprised. He stretched his hand forward more intentionally and waited half a moment. Nothing happened.

"Ra'kahnah," he said evenly and in the same manner one would say, "Interesting." He lowered his hand, and spoke in Basic. "You see, Dark Star, the dark side has certainly provided. . . even a vessel."

"You can shove the dark-" Videsse began and then heard footsteps behind her. She whirled around, but it was too late.

A female acolyte with a stun-gun in hand had already fired. The charged pulse had instantly punched Videsse's midsection, rippling and expanding up her chest to her head, where a void of darkness seemed to swell over her vision, and her consciousness evaporated like a black phantom mist. The last thing she remembered as she fell to the ground: Cam was gone.


	32. Episode X On the Threshold

"She's going to die." It was Terrah's voice. "She quit too fast."

"Yes, she did," Boba returned.

Videsse was again swimming in the thick dream state; a black mist that coalesced into oil and enveloped her, only this time, she was acutely aware of the unwieldy weight of her throbbing headache. It was so painful, she could not think. She opened her eyes and could see nothing within the viscous darkness. Her left limbs moved, and she felt the cold thickness of the dream flow over her arms in ebbs. She tried to breathe, but the effort felt like liquid ice and fire within her, burning her lungs with every breath. She gasped in a spasmodic cry and tried to hold her breath again as long as she was able.

Her right side seemed not to move as if it was pressed against a wall, however, at the same time, it felt to her like she was floating. Her mind could not make sense of it. She pushed away from the wall in the darkness, but she found herself too weak, and every muscle lurched in excruciating epileptic fits.

The dream thinned a bit in the center of her vision and it cleared just enough to see through a swirling tunnel. Far away was a woman, a clone, lying on a floor, the floor of what appeared to be a stone-carved prison cell. She was unarmored and clothed in only in a tight-fitting synthetic under-armor, and a linen tunic; both were drenched with sweat and clung to her in bunched folds. Videsse recognized the clothing. Wet strands of hair stuck to the woman's face and forehead. She was lying on her right side and writhing as if trying to move through water. She was crying and gasping for air.

Videsse tried to swim to her, but with her side pressed against the invisible wall, she could not move. She cried out and winced at the pain. Still, she pushed against the invisible wall, and reached her trembling arms toward the woman, gasping and sobbing. The woman did the same.

"Patch, you can't do this alone." Boba's voice said.

"Neither could we," Terrah said.

"Stop calling me _Patch_," Videsse blurted. "Nicknames are for people who need-" She choked on the words.

Her vision altered seamlessly and suddenly as if another wave of her dream had simply moved her; now she was seeing through the eyes of the woman on the floor, still, through the narrow tunnel, the black swirling oily mist covering almost all of her vision. Her body still writhed in pain; her head still throbbed; the dream still continued.

"Dess," a voice spoke, a different voice, a hissing voice; a voice she recognized.

"Dess," it repeated.

Videsse struggled to right herself, succeeding in raising her shoulder just a few centimeters from the ground, before falling back, exhausted.

"Dess," the voice hissed again.

"Donal?" Videsse managed to muster enough air to somehow speak into the black liquid dream.

Donal laughed. "It _is_ you!"

Videsse coughed and gasped as a horrifying thought came to her. "You're dead. You're dead, too." To her, his voice in this place was enough proof.

She rolled to her stomach and buried her face in her arm, trying to push back the building despair with in her. She felt the sweat between her head and upper arm; the cold and disagreeable dampness, wet and unpleasant.

"Dead!" Donal's voice exclaimed. "Not so lucky. You're not dead. Thank the stars! They were coming for you, and I couldn't warn you. I thought they might... Are you alright? Are you hurt?"

Videsse looked up through the thick dream and could see in the distance prison bars. She laboriously stretched an arm over arm, and slid her aching legs, crawling like a Gorryl slug through the muck toward the bars.

"You're here with my mother and Boba," Videsse exhaled in pain and despair. "You're dead."

"What are you talking about, Dess," Donal returned. "They must've drugged you or something."

"This place, my dream." Videsse reached the bars. Her trembling hands tried to grip the bars but missed. "This is where I hear them."

"This place?" Donal's voice came from a cell next to hers. "This place is where those _Cave Shades_ keep us until they use us for their rituals."

"_Shades_?" Videsse's voice was weak.

"Yeah, those religious cracks. They tried one of their rituals on me last night. But, said I wasn't a worthy vessel. Figures." He hissed in disapprobation.

"You don't hear them; the whispers?" Videsse begged. She had her back against the wall, and curled her legs to her chest. She jerked and then almost jumped up, as she saw three dark shadows rush her vision then disappear. She screamed at the fright, then asked, "You don't see them!"

Donal's voice became stern and he paused. "Dess, what's happening to you?"

Videsse closed her eyes and still, she could see the mist and black oil like a stirred cauldron with a rising vapor. It never went away.

"I think I quit the whiskey too fast," she admitted. She hated it.

Donal nodded and thought for a second before replying. "You are a lot like Boba."

"You're really here?" she asked in desperation, still questioning this reality. "This is not my dream?"

"Yes, Dess," Donal said. "I'm not dead."

Videsse began to tremble and a realization gripped her. "I can't wake up," she cried.

"You need a drink," Boba's voice said. "You can't quit this way. It'll kill you, like it almost killed me."

"I don't need anything!" Videsse managed to raise her voice. "And I don't need you!"

"What are you saying, Dess," Donal answered not privy to the voices of her madness.

Videsse could not make sense of her existence, and Donal's voice confused her. Voices mingled. Images melted into each other. Emotions were indistinguishable. Reality and dream blended. "No, not-" At one moment she was in a rage at Boba, in the next she was fearful of what was going on, then a faint happiness finding that Donal was alive, then confusion wondering if it was real. Her thoughts and emotions were as murky as her vision, and as crippled as her body.

"There you are, Dess," now it was another voice, Cam's.

Videsse reached for the bars, her arms waving before finally grabbing one of the bars. She looked up. Her mind was another whirl of confusion with the new voice. Her primal fear had overpowered the elation of hearing the voice of Donal, but now the voice of Cam drew her anger to the surface as if he was the reason for everything. For a moment the fear was covered over.

"You!" she gritted through her teeth and strained to lean her torso close enough to see beyond the bars. Cam's blue face came into her view. He held one of her gauntlets. "You got me in here! I'm stuck because of you!" Her hands began to tremble like before.

"Yeah, and now I'm gonna get you out!" He smiled innocently. "Looks like you need help and I've found some."

Videsse shook her head and trembled in rage. "No. This is all your fault. I'd be fine if you could just do as you're told." Her face flashed with panic as she darted her gaze around her like a cornered tusk cat seeing shadows. She looked back at Cam. "Maybe, I do need help," she said in a low contemplative voice, then raised her voice to complete the statement, "But, I don't need you."

Cam figured she was acting like she had in the past and continued. "Well, I found someone, that's why I-"

"Shut up!" Videsse interrupted. "Enough! I don't need you. I don't want you. If I need anything, it's never to see you again! Leave, Cam H'Darr!" She tried to shove him through the bars.

Cam's face dropped. "Seriously, Dess. I can get you out."

"Stop calling me Dess. It's Videsse. I'm not your people. You have none! Now get out of my sight." As soon as she had said it, a new emotion arose within her, one completely foreign to her.

Cam's normally uplifted eyes, and smirking lips changed. They fell, like snow on the dead ground, cold and final. Cam stepped back, and more than snow, a drop fell; one drop, not even enough to compare it to rain. Was it for him, the last drop that would escape as his heart moved away slowly like a planet drifting from the only sun it had ever known?

Videsse saw the change. It reminded her of a face she had seen ages ago, one of a man standing alone on a dead wasteland, his red eyes distant and despairing as he looked on the clone child of a woman he thought was dead. It reminded her of the same thing she saw in the reflection of her whiskey bottle as she plowed the grain alone in that same wasteland after both her mother and father were taken from her. She immediately regretted her words. She could see the alteration in Cam's face, and the foreign emotion strengthened within her. She struggled to find words within her foggy thoughts.

Cam drifted from her. They were both planets, now beginning their drift away from the sun, and rain would fall no more, only snow, only death. Her mother and father had done the same. What if they had not returned in the end? What would have become of them? What will become of her? Cam? These fragile thoughts tormented Videsse, and still, she did not know how to express these sufferings and remorses.

Cam wiped the tear from his face. His distant face revealed that he heard and saw everything he needed to in Videsse's words and unfamiliar expression. This time, his face shown plainly, it was real.

Cam stepped back. "Fine, Videsse Otlell," he said in a low voice. "You won't get my help anymore." He turned, and told some unseen person, "She's all yours." He departed, his footsteps continuing up the stairs before he commented once more from the distance, "You're real stupid, Videsse, and I hate you!"

"Wait . . ." Videsse reached out. Her voice was small and weak. "Come back. I'm... I'm..." Cam did not hear.

"Now look what you've done," someone else stated.

Videssesse was taken aback by another new voice. "Really?" Videsse quietly said out loud, trying to hide the stabbing pain in her heart. She leaned her back against the wall. "Someone else? Aren't there _any_ guards?" The sarcastic façade was pathetic and ineffective this time.

"Dead ones," the man replied.

Videsse stretched her neck to look up. It was a man she recognized, the unattractive dark man she had seen in Maz's watering hole, Ben Solo, clothed in one of the acolytes hooded black robes as if he was familiar with them.

For a moment, Videsse's regret left her as she reasoned. "This _has_ to be a dream," she said to herself.

"It's not," Ben replied. "Stand back."

He lit his lightsaber in a blinding yellow light.

Videsse retracted and tried to stand, but only succeeded in sliding off the wall and falling on her back. She howled in pain and gripped her scarred right leg; proof that she was not dreaming.

Melted metal dripped from the cage lock, as the hot blade sliced through it. Almost instantly, red lights flared and an alarm pierced the halls. Ben looked concerned, but calm.

"Get up," he ordered. "Let's go."

Videsse tried again, and collapsed. "I... I..."

Ben huffed, extinguished his blade and walked over to her, lowering himself, and gently wrapping her right arm over his shoulder.

Videsse's face contorted in pain as they rose, and then relaxed once standing.

"What are _you_ doing here?"

Ben started to walk her out of the cell. He took a deep breath and answered, "Penance." He said no more. The word meant nothing to Videsse, and she was in no state to inquire further.

"Wait," she said. "Free him." She impotently tried to pull Ben toward Donal's cage.

Ben stopped, looked at the Trandoshan who was gripping the cage bars. Ben thought for half a second, shuddered in half-disgusted, and then with a quick flare of his jaundice blade he sliced through Donal's lock. The saber extinguished almost as fast as it had lit and found its place again at his side next to a blaster.

"Thanks," Donal replied.

Donal swept himself under Videsse's left arm and embraced her. Her right arm fell from Ben's shoulder and wrapped instinctively around Donal. She did not think. She simply wept.

"You're really here."

"Okay," Ben interrupted tactlessly. "Let's go." He led the way without watching to see if Donal and Videsse followed, but they did.

The three headed for the stairway that Cam had left by, however, in between the blaring alarm footsteps could be heard descending. Ben stopped when he heard the approaching acolytes. He quickly closed and locked the detention door, then swung around and pointed past Donal and Videsse. "That way."

Videsse looked down as they traversed the prison corridor. A trail of black and brown stains lined the floor where the acolytes had repeatedly spilled gruel rations for their prisoners. Donal and Videsse had not been the first prisoners these halls had known.

They reached the end of the hall where the stains led to a door. Ben opened it then smashed the control pad with his elbow, and the three slipped through. He closed the door from the control pad on the other side. Automatic lights came to life as if activated by a ghost. They passed into another perpendicular hallway.

"Which way?" Donal asked.

Videsse heard Terrah's whisper. "Don't follow the stains. They'll take you deeper in the caves."

Both Videsse and Ben said in unison, "Don't follow the stains, They'll take you-" Ben stopped speaking and looked at Videsse as she finished. "-deeper in the caves."

Ben was frozen for a moment and looked at Videsse, shock enveloping his face. "How did you-"

"No time," Donal interrupted. "Let's go." It was now his turn to push the crew forward.

After only a few dozen meters, they arrived at a stairway. Two black cloaks hung on either side. Ben grabbed one and threw it at Donal without words, but Donal understood. Ben did not wait and started ascending the stairs to the next level. For the meantime, Donal just let the robe drape over the opposite shoulder, the one without Videsse.

They emerged on the next level, a wide black room. Videsse recognized it as the domed star room she had seen when she entered, although no acolytes were entranced this time. They started to cross, the exit just beyond them, but Videsse kicked her heels in and tried to slow Donal.

"Wait," she mustered, "Wait. Peezee. I need to get Peezee."

Ben huffed and rolled his eyes.

"Wait!" Videsse cried, and tried to fall in dead wait. "I'm not going anywhere without my droid."

Donal looked at Videsse and with fear he glanced at Ben, silently imploring, "What are you going to do?" Donal was never one for danger.

"We're not getting the droid," Ben said flatly. "Just you."

"No. Me, Donal, Cam, and Peezee," The old Videsse could not believe this demand was coming from her. "Boba came back for me. My mother came back for me." She did not speak the last comments. They were only thoughts, but her lips silently moved. She was beginning to understand, and her regret was becoming more apparent in that light.

"I can't get you _and_ your droid," Ben replied.

Videsse shook her head; her voice stifled. She felt as if something was tightening an invisible grip on her throat, not sorcery, but contrition.

"I'll get him," Donal finally said, his voice shaking. "Dess, I'll get him." This second repetition was Donal convincing himself.

Videsse looked up, tears began to form anew, and she nodded. "Four," she coughed. "Four levels up," she tried to clear her throat again. "Get Peezee a blaster. He'll get you out."

Donal nodded. "Okay."

Before he knew it, Ben had placed his blaster in Donal's free hand, and took up Videsse from his other. "Fine. Now let's go," Ben stated.

Ben turned away from Donal, who was quickly throwing on the robe. Ben and Videsse limped across the the gem-lit room. To Videsse, the air was swimming with wisps and phantoms that seemed to weave through the room like black ribbons in the wind. She closed her eyes to assuage her fright, but to her dismay, the wisps were still there, ever present with her failing mind. When they reached the far side, she exhaled, not even realizing that she had been holding her breath.

Voices and commotion could be heard from the stairwell as acolytes below were discovering the missing prisoners. Ben helped Videsse through the door into the room with the painted dark side demon, a place Videsse was dreading to return to. As he shut the door, the lights oddly did not light this time; probably a security feature in the event of an alarm. However, Videsse could somehow still see the winged creature watching her from the painted wall on her right, as if its eyes glowed and followed her. Its clawed wings seemed to pass beyond the stoned wall. Then, as they walked the black corridor it felt as if the creature had escaped the painting, stepped onto the mosaic floor, and was walking behind them, mimicking their footsteps to hide its own. A cold wind blew from behind them; the door opening? Or black wings?

Videsse tried to move faster, but her feet dragged. The painted images of the demon crouching outside of the firelight and flying over unsuspecting victims, though she could not see them, they haunted her. She pulled herself weakly up on Ben's shoulder, and instinctively reached for the blaster that was not on her hip. It was frightful for her that they had to stop at the outer door. Every half second, felt like a minute as Ben stretched his hand to the control pad. The imagined creature behind drew nearer; a creature no one could see. Ben's finger lit the door panel. An open door image showed on the display. Did Videsse hear a heavy exhale behind her? Ben pressed the open image. Did her sweat soaked neck and tunic feel a cold breath just centimeters behind her; and sharp eyes focused intently, clawed wings stretched to extension and a wide tooth-lined grin dripping with wet hunger? The metal door gasped and rose with a frigid blast of air. Light broke in, but not sunlight. It was firelight, torchlight.

"As I have said, have faith my brothers and sisters." It was Nolan's cutting voice.

Not one, but two lightsaber hilts flew from Ben's belt. Both darted through the air, where Nolan's grip captured them; a black hilt in his right, and a silver hilt in his left.

Before Videsse and Ben, Nolan stood, surrounded by twelve hooded acolytes. Seven had fiery torches, and the rest aimed blasters at them.

"Rejoice, our Dark Master is, even now, on the threshold." Nolan turned the blade hilts inspecting them emotionlessly, before a thin-lined smile appeared over his countenance.


	33. Episode X The Ritual

It was well into the night by this time, and stars speckled the sky with unfamiliar and unfriendly constellations, like eyes watching silently from another realm. The freezing air was still, but it needed no wind to accomplish its purpose. Videsse would have been shivering if her body was not failing. Instead, she had punctuated moments of shakes, enough to break the ice that was slowly forming on her sweaty under-armor and tunic. Two acolytes threw her down unmindfully onto the black obsidian circle on the east side of the mosaic, the pedestals, her ship, and the speeder arranged around her.

Nolan walked over to the one empty pedestal and placed Kylo Ren's cross-bladed saber onto it. The hilt was caught in an invisible magnetic cylinder and floated unnaturally a hand's breadth above it.

"It would have been more appropriate if you led this ritual, Lord Kylo Ren," he stated, looking at the floating hilt as if imagining a distant and pleasant memory. He turned to Ben who restrained outside of the circle.

They forced Ben to his knees, and two acolytes strongly pressed his shoulders on each side. Ben gritted his teeth, but remained still.

Nolan walked to him with high shoulders and an arrogant stride. He produced both of Ben's confiscated blades and lit them, hot yellow and blue brands crossed in front of him.

Nolan inspected them quietly, the dichromatic blades lighting his face with mingled white light. He seemed pleased with something.

"Lord Kylo Ren," he addressed. "Murderer of our Lord Snoke, and traitor to the Dark Side." The history of Snoke's demise was common knowledge in the galaxy, since Kylo Ren and Darth Irata (Ben and Rey), had made a public display of Snoke's dead body before the First Order's generals.

Ben looked at the ground, but one of the acolytes gripped his hair and forced him to look up.

"You have rejected our Master," Nolan said as if passing a judgment. "And so our Dark Master has rejected you."

Ben muttered something defiant under his breath. Nolan's white eyebrows raised, but he did not acknowledge Ben's words further.

"And now you are a Jedi?" Nolan continued, and he produced a slight huff, almost a laugh. "A Jedi without the Force? What did our Lord Snoke do to you when you became a traitor?" He squinted his eyes in thought as he seemed to probe Ben. "You are… empty."

Ben looked surprised. Somehow Nolan could perceive Ben's separation from the Force, and even more surprising to Ben, Nolan divined that Snoke had done it to him.

Still, Ben said nothing.

"And her," Nolan continued, hardly moving his chin toward Videsse's collapsed body. "Has our Lord Snoke dealt with her as well?"

A millisecond of confusion passed over Ben's face, but it was not lost on Nolan. "Ah," Nolan smiled. "Is it another working of the Force you Jedi are ignorant of? That is hardly surprising."

Ben struggled to loosen the acolytes' grip on his shoulders.

Nolan held the blue blade down and directly at Ben's neck to check his opposition. Ben restrained himself in the blue light and winced at the heat of the blade on his face.

"_Midichlorians_," Nolan stated evenly. "Another word you Jedi use for something you know nothing about." He turned the blade so that it laid perpendicularly under Ben's chin and he leaned in as if to show Ben more closely some detail. "This is our Lord Vader's blade. His _Midichlorians _(to use your ignorant _Jedi_ terms) still dwell in it. And your Midichlorians-" He held the opposite blade in the air above his own head and extinguished it. "Well . . . yours seem to have abandoned you."

Nolan extinguished the remaining blade. "Now, Lord Ren, watch the Force that has rejected you." He pointed to the cross-bladed hilt on its pedestal. "You traitor, your own Force will bring the Dark Master. Be glad, that you have not failed so greatly as to prevent his coming."

"Bring Snoke back and I will defeat him again," Ben spoke aloud for the first time, as if his wrath could not be contained anymore.

One of the acolytes cuffed him on the left side of his head, and Ben bent under the blow. The two acolytes then forced him upright again.

"Snoke?" Nolan chuckled, but then reclaimed his composure. "Again, you Jedi think so small." He turned his back on Ben and approached Videsse.

She was curled in a ball trying to preserve any heat she could, her breath clouding the air about her head, and ice forming in her hair. Nolan crouched behind her and placed his hand on her heaving back.

"Yes," Nolan whispered. "You are close to death. So much the better. You will not be able to resist. But, there is not much time. Daruhk an'shah toh!" This last statement was an imperative and shouted to the acolytes present. Those with torches moved to surround the circle behind the "artifacts", lighting the circle with a pale and impotent, warm glow. Ben was lifted and forced to position himself a spitting distance from the south side of the circle.

Nolan stood raised his arms above himself and chanted a phrase aloud to the sky. The language was not Arkanian so I can not relay to you its meaning, but it was obviously related to the Arkanian dialect, sounding harsher and perhaps aboriginal, suggesting it was likely an ancestral tongue. Each acolyte responded with another phrase, again not Arkanian.

Videsse looked up, her vision still swirling with the black mist and phantoms, as she balanced on the edge of this life and the next. Her headache was gone, her nauseousness as well, and the cold did not seem to bite as much as it should have; all signs of her descent into the next world.

To Ben Solo and any other observer, the only observation that they could make was a sudden downdraft of wind that could simply have been explained by the shape of the valley and the movement of a high-pressure system. However, to Videsse there was more; a new and sudden event that horrified her.

She screamed out and fell backward, trying to back up, sliding her legs with clumsy kicks. To her, black mist seeped from each of the artifacts. It wisped like vapor, swirled in tendrils, and then coalesced in a cyclone above Nolan, spinning and flashing with blood-red flashes and eyes, two glowing red eyes.

Nolan repeated his unknown phrase and concentrated his attention on the sky. He closed his eyes in a deep struggle as if he was somehow holding the whirlwind in place invisibly, in the same way that he held Videsse's grenade earlier. He could not see the tempest, himself, but he was obviously aware of its existence, as a smile crossed his face.

The cyclone then fell as if poured from the sky over the top of Nolan, and rippled into waves at the fringe, before rising into two massive black wings, and a dark creature in the center, three times the size of any man. Its two red eyes fixated on Videsse. The form was still smoke-like, as it swirled within the creature, yet still, it had a shape. Acolyte chants bolstered it somewhere in the far distance of Videsse's consciousness.

Videsse's eyes widened into primal fear, her voice was lost and screams found it impossible to escape from her. The being approached. The creature eclipsed Nolan from her view.

Again, to an outside observer, nothing but the wind could be felt. Nolan was simply standing, entranced, his eyes closed, and his face serene. Videsse cowered, terrified to look in his direction, but what she was afraid of was impossible to discern, and could simply be explained as her transition into the final stages of withdrawal.

The beast drew nearer, it's greedy grimace leaned forward, and its wings extended filling Videsse's vision, like the hound Rook Na that crouched over her years ago as it opened its dripping jaws to end her. However, this time was different. Her mother was dead. Was there was no one to ride in and save her? Terrah would not fly over in _Slave-1, _blasters firing, the invincible enemy collapsing in its black bile. No, that would not happen. She was gone. It was then end. Videsse knew it. No one would rescue her. Her complexion waned into grey, as her body's capillaries contracted in the cold. She looked like her mother at her death.

Videsse almost lost consciousness in fright, but then something unexpected occurred, something that everyone present could perceive if not hear, something that if I were to tell you of at the start of this story, you would have thought it fantastical; impossible. Our heroine, the brave and deadly, the dark hunter; yes, our very dear Clone-Denyer, the fool-hardy youth, opened her mouth, and one word found itself being born.

"Help." It was just an infant cry, a small thing, but no less insignificant. It is the cry that the weak remember, and the strong forget, the very word that makes the weak strong. It was the truth of us all, that those that perish refuse, and those that stand upright embrace; the foolishness of our strength, and the wisdom of our weakness, the very paradox of our existence.

Did that petition reach the distant stars? Who can say? What occured next must be explained in rational and materialistic terms, of course; that her mind was fading and holding on by a thread to this physical world, and so she saw two figures; a hallucination of a man and a woman, those that she desperately wanted at that moment. They materialized and were standing in front of her, their backs to her; their forms not unfamiliar. They were not black smoke, like the rest of the world, but bright and white, a man and woman holding hands and forming a wall between her and the phantom.

The dark creature winced in the light, and covered its red eyes with one wing, then glanced beyond in curiosity and antipathy. Nolan opened his eyes, still not seeing, but perceiving. His smile left, and he bit his lower lip, then repeated his chant and tensed his arms. His voice became louder and raspy as he repeated the ancient chant. The acolytes echoed the words.

The winged creature regained its fortitude, and stood tall, wings extending out in a display of strength as it approached. The two bright figures advanced, and then stood resolute in the gap as the creature charged like a muscular Reek in a rage; an unstoppable force and immovable ones.

The ground convulsed as a blinding flash erupted between Videsse and Nolan. Hot ash and dust burst in all directions and both were thrown back with the shock wave. They slid a few meters. Nolan cried out in agony as he sat up, hot ash falling off of him, his face singed, and his eyes red with charred tissue. He looked up, but by his darting gaze it was obvious that he had been blinded. He gripped his face, but recoiled at the sensitivity of the cooked flesh.

The blasts continued from above. Laser blasts rained down from the familiar _Slave-1_, and showered the platform with hot missiles. It was not Terrah this time, but Cam, the foolish kid firing down upon the acolytes, not even considering that he might injure Videsse.


	34. Episode X All is Spent

Nolan rose to his hands and knees and cursed the sky in unmitigated wrath. He reached for a lightsaber, but both of the confiscated blades had been thrown from him in the blast. He groped in his blindness for a hilt on the ground, new blaster craters exploding around him every moment. He stopped, collected himself like the monk that he was, and reached out with the Force, his hand stretched toward a pedestal. Kylo Ren's blade obeyed his call, and flew to him, ignited, and flashed in sweeping arcs. Two of _Slave-1's_ laser blasts deflected off the red blade. One blast returned to the starfighter, glancing off its starboard stabilizer. The barrage stopped. Either Cam had discerned the danger, or more likely _Raider_, who was flying the ship, had counseled him to stop.

Nolan stood in the settling dust and ash, the ground hot with molten cracks. He angled his head down and reached one hand to his eyes feeling the charred crusting flesh. Rage contorted his blackened face, but still, it was controlled. "Rudcka'shah heshoh!" Any student of language would recognize the term Rudcka in its accusative case, and the verb's imperative "-oh" and thus may discern that Nolan was commanding his acolytes, "Get the off-worlder."

Ben, had seen _Slave-1_ approach from above a moment before it had fired, and anticipated a distraction, so as soon as the first blasts materialized, he swept the feet out from under the acolyte on his right, who fell and dropped his blaster. Instantly, Ben had the acolyte's blaster in his non-dominant left hand. Without switching the blaster, he rolled away from the fallen one, onto his back and fired two shots into the standing acolyte's chest.

The fallen acolyte was on him in a flash and grappled across Ben's chest for the hot blaster. Ben tried to hold the acolyte back with his right hand ineffectively from his tenuous position and so he pushed the acolyte away to "tighten the band." Then Ben released his hold and let the acolyte use his own energy to fly over him. Ben snapped his right arm between the acolytes legs and rolled to his stomach; throwing the acolyte like a catapult. Ben flipped onto his back again, the acolyte now well to his left. Ben snapped two blaster shots at him. They sliced through the acolyte, one side of his chest and exited the other.

Ben sprang to his feet, and spun to see the whole combat zone. Two female acolytes with torches moved away from him and approached Videsse with stun guns aimed on her. His black hilted lightsaber was only a few meters away to his right. Most of the acolytes were firing at _Slave-1_ ineffectively, as blaster fire defected off its shielded armor. At that instant, Ben had a free action before ten acolytes turned their attention to him.

He transferred the blaster to his right hand and fired two shots at the female acolytes that advanced on Videsse. His aim was true, and they crumpled to the ground. Ben darted toward his saber hilt, and sprayed more shots at the now-aware acolytes behind him. This time, none hit any mark. Ben rolled on the ground, avoided fresh blaster fire, and retrieved his saber. A hot dart singed his left shoulder. He cried out, and ran for a pedestal to find cover, throwing one more blaster shot in front of him and killing the stunned looking acolyte that stood next to the _Vigilance_. Three acolyte torches had now fallen on the ground with their dead acolytes, and the night became that much darker.

Nolan perceived that five of his brethren had died, even without sight. He could sense each of them, and the boy in the ship above. However, there were still things he could not perceive, and that unsettled him.

"Rhik Ruddcka!" "Where is the off-worlder!"

He stepped forward cautiously, tilting his head and trying to feel into the twilight. His blade was impotent to illuminate his darkness. However, his steps were surprisingly accurate amidst the pockmarked obsidian terrain, and though he was blinded, he was still able to see in another sense. It was a phenomenon of those that claimed control of this metaphysical Force, or it was simply a honing of all their senses, of hearing, touch, and smell that would not be unusual for the most disciplined of any monk order. A discussion of this can and must be found elsewhere, lest we risk missing what was about to happen, for Nolan walking across the black circle was coming within a few meters of the supine Videsse.

"Rhik herra, Ruddcka?" "Where are you, off-worlder?" He swept his humming blade side to side in front of him.

Videsse heard his voice far in the distance as if echoing in a long hallway, even though he was only three meters away. Her vision of this world was gone, only swirling black mist, and she desperately wanted to sleep. She rolled onto her stomach and felt something hard press into her midriff. Again, the sensation felt like it was far away and happening to someone else, like the distant woman she had seen in the detention cell, but she managed to reach and feel the cold metal shaft, a lightsaber hilt.

How it found its way under her, is a mystery of physics, and I admit, I do not have an explanation. For every materialist, and I am not one, would have known that the blade should have been thrown behind Nolan in the blast, yet here it was, Anakin Skywalker's silver hilt which we can see, though Videsse could not. She ran her fingers over it, finding the saber port, the a butt, and activator. She gripped the hilt in both hands, but did not activate it. She could remember a young eleven-year-old girl hiding behind a dark supply crate, and gripping a heavy adamant blade, her kidnapper approaching. She remembered that enveloping fate approaching, The Keeper, like the creature and like Its acolyte that drew nearer now. Death, opened its jaws with its voracious teeth, ready to engulf her, in the same way that it threatens us all, though most are not aware.

Videsse remembered that day in the Keeper's hold. She had forgotten who she was then like she had forgotten much now. Someone came that day, someone that reminded her, and spoke her forgotten name. It was so long ago. Boba came that day, but not before she had killed her villain. She was weak then, just like now. She bit her lip and strained to slide her knees under her, her chest on her knees, and the gripped blade, heavy on the ground. She was not an eleven-year-old girl with an adamant blade, but not so different from that day either. She turned her head toward Nolan's distant voice.

"Dark Star, your purpose has been ordained. Do not resist." Nolan spoke in Basic. He was now under two meters away. A shot came from his left. Ben had fired two shots, and without a thought, Nolan flashed his blade to deflect both, his advance undeterred.

Videsse could almost see Nolan. He was mostly hidden in the black mist, with a black form, but his face was not Aranian orange, rather smoky-grey, almost white, and two red lines bisected his red eyes. His white hair was gone. To you or I, he looked no different from before, however to Videsse, she saw the man from the mural, the murderer, the familicide. Though his blade was lit for us to see, it was invisible to Videsse, and she did not recognize how close the sweeping brand was coming to her until she felt the heat from the blade on her face and heard its humming crescendo. It had not cut her, but she felt it centimeters from her forehead.

Reflexively, she gasped and lurched back. It was enough. Nolan looked down, knowing she was at his feet. "There you are." He reached for her with his right hand, the left ready with the crimson blade if he sensed danger. He was ready to cut her down if she were to attack as the Harch did on Nar Shaddaa.

Videsse's thumb felt the activation switch but restrained half of a second.

Nolan's hand drew nearer in the darkness.

"Dark Star!" a new voice called. It was a droid voice, a cherished one. Then laser lines of blaster fire flew over her head.

The blinded Nolan recoiled, with apt instinct. He was not hit, and instantly, his blade danced amidst the darts, deflecting and dodging. Four were deflected, not destined to end his life. No, there was another day that this man would find the arms of death, but not today. He would still have time to repent of his deeds if it were possible; a grace of the universe.

Videsse lit the blade, and in the same instant swept upward into the black mist. Nolan screamed. Both of his now dismembered hands fell to the ground, and Kylo Ren's blade extinguished. She then swung the blue blade across, exhaling vocally as she did. Nolan's legs were cut from him at the knees. He fell like a dropped quinto sack, shrieking in agony and holding his blackened wrists to his chest. With that, the last of Videsse's energy was spent, the blue blade died, and she fell forward onto Nolan's dismembered hands.

_Sleep,_ was her last thought as she fell, gently, slowly, like she was laying her head on her mother's lap one more time. _Just a moment. Sleep. _

Her muscles relaxed. The ice formed. Her eyes closed. It felt to her as if unseen fingers were unloosing the braids of her frozen tangles.


	35. Episode X Let's Get Out of Here

Ben, for this time, had been pinned behind the pedestal that harbored the pyramidal relic, with acolytes shooting endlessly in his direction. The pedestal gave only enough cover to protect him if he crouched and kept his torso away from them, and even then his knees were exposed. Blaster fire whizzed past him with electric squeals, and he snapped his legs straight trying to hide his knees. He fell to his hips; a precarious position to attack from. He threw some blind and useless shots around the pedestal when they paused. They advanced, and from the sound of their voices, more had come from inside the mountain.

Ben looked across at Nolan, as he approached Videsse's collapsed form. A few more steps and Nolan would be on her. Without thinking, Ben snapped his arm out and fired two shots at Nolan, the shots we had already seen Nolan deflect. A rebounding shot landed a half meter from Ben's hip. Another acolyte shot shattered the exposed blaster from Ben's hand. Ben whipped his now empty hand back to his chest.

"Kriff!" Ben blurted the euphemism. All he had left was his blade, and he knew that without the Force he could not deflect blaster fire. He looked at the _Vigilance_, ten meters away from him. There was no possibility of getting to that ship unharmed. He looked up at the hovering _Firespray_-_what is that kid doing up there,_ he thought.

It may give us some amusement to know that Cam was thinking something very similar. "What should I do, now?" Cam asked himself, as he gripped the laser trigger, finally recognizing the danger of shooting anywhere near Videsse.

The droid speaker crackled in static as if _Raider_ had exhaled a frustrated huff. "Squeeze the trigger," _Raider_ replied, "Or I will." He spun _Slave-1_ toward the now two dozen acolytes that had emerged from the mountain. Cam followed _Raider's_ orders and a fiery red hailstorm fell like a plague from _Slave-1_ onto the sacred platform. A few acolytes were destroyed in the erupting blasts, and six or more ducked back into the doorway, the rest scattered.

Ben saw the opportunity and rose like a flash. He sprinted toward the _Vigilance_, a few blaster shots lapping his heels as he dove behind the ship's main body. His heaving chest struggled to catch his breath.

Ben had tried to help Videsse, but why? He had said, penance when Videsse asked him; and that was exactly true. Penance because he knew that he was about to steal her ship, and thus he burdened himself with guilt. This was not the same Kylo Ren the galaxy had known eight years ago; this was a man that walked under an oppressive shadow, a man that questioned every action he made. He was a man that did not trust himself anymore.

However, that is another story and one that interests this narrator very little. The only thing relevant to our story is that he was about to steal the _Vigilance_, an action he would soon regret; although if he did not steal it, he would have regretted that as well. Oh, the dilemmas we suffer ourselves. This man not only would regret any action he took with the _Vigilance_ but also the loss of both Kylo Ren's lightsaber and his grandfather's lightsaber. There was no escape from the prison of regret that he placed himself in. There was no one that would save him from his internal despair. Still, he is of no more concern to me and this story.

It was at this moment, PZ-85 with Donal following in his wake, emerged from the mountain opening, Videsse expended her last mite of energy, Nolan fell to the ground in agony, and PZ-85 cut down the rest of the acolytes with exactly the same number of blaster shots as there were acolytes; headshots. One acolyte, whether from skill or luck, had fired a true shot, and PZ-85's left shoulder splintered in pieces, leaving the arm hanging by a sparking bent metal thread. The droid's right arm, which held the blaster, sufficiently dealt with that acolyte's aspirations.

Donal rushed up to Videsse and put his scaly hand under her head, completely ignoring the writhing Nolan. PZ-85, however, had not ignored Nolan and aimed Ben's blaster directly at the crown of his head. The man, even without sight, having heard the two arrive knew what was about to happen.

"No!" He wailed, his blackened eyes wide so his cooked flesh was apparent to see. "Mercy!"

PZ-85, as a droid, what could he know of mercy? Obviously nothing.

"I am only doing what I was made for," Nolan bent over in despair, as if bowing in homage. "Only what my Dark Master wished." His voice was pleading, desperate, and broken.

What do I, the narrator, know? Still, I am caught in astonishment, for this craft of metal, wires, gears and bolts, this PZ-85 unit withdrew the blaster and stepped back. Mercy? I am unsure, and if I could hear your words, maybe you might have an explanation sufficient. Yet, why must we always dwell on the impossible and unknowable?

"Is she g-going to live?" PZ-85 asked Donal.

"Dunno," Donal replied, slipping his arms under Videsse and rotating her so he could pick her up. She gripped both lightsaber blades as if in some stage of rigor mortis. "I've had to nurse Boba through this a few times. She needs a little whiskey. If it's going to work, she could feel better in less than a minute. If not-"

The _Vigilance's _sharp and loud sublight engines resounded, cutting Donal's comment short. Donal and PZ-85 looked up to see the dark T-silhouette rise and rotate before taking a direct line for the sky. As it rose, two Needle-class ships darted after it from a landing pad above them. Ben was gone and with him Videsse's ship.

"That's not good," Donal said, referring to the active acolyte starfighters rather than the loss of the _Vigillance_. "We need to get out of here, now."

_Slave-1_ came to rest next to them, and its ventral ramp was already down even before it had landed.

Donal having Videsse in his arms took long strides to ascend the ramp. "Quick, Peezee!" The droid followed silently, as if still considering if he should dispatched Nolan. He did not.

Donal laid Videsse on her back in the passenger seat to the left of the ramp, and looked up to see Cam ogling down from the cockpit.

"Kid," he blurted, "Where's her whiskey?"

Cam looked surprised. "She quit that."

"Shut up, Kid. She needs it. Where is it?" Donal opened one of the sliding storage cabinets; no whiskey, but the heated bacta bag was there. "Perfect."

He threw the bact bag over Videsse like a blanket, not caring about filling it with bacta, but more concerned with the heating elements. He activated the heating element, and clicked the restaining harness over the top of the bag and Videsse.

"Here," Cam called from above, and dropped Videsse's whiskey bottle. Donal caught it, opened, and poured just a capful passed Videsse's cracked and dry lips. Almost instantly the alcohol soaked into her mucous membranes, like water on the parched ground of Geonosis, disappearing as if it had never existed. Donal smoothed the strands of hair that had escaped Videsse's braids, and looked hopefully onto her closed eyes. He poured another capful past her lips. She swallowed weakly.

"Uh, Mister," Cam called back. "We better get going! They're coming."

_Raider_ closed the ramp. Four _Needle-class_ ships had exited from the fighter bay and were positioning to prevent _Slave-1's_ escape. They restrained their attack lest they damage the sacred ground further.

Donal jumped up. PZ-85 had strapped himself into the passenger seat on the other side of the ramp and was lying ready.

"Get out of the cockpit, Kid," Donal barked as he began climbing up. Cam did, happy to let someone else take the reins, and climbed to the lower gun.

In one move, Donal was in the flight seat with his hands on the control arm. "Let's get out of here."

The seven _Needle-class_ ships aimed their elliptical plasma rays in his direction.


	36. Episode X A Good Time to Wake Up

We have seen before, our heroine floating in the thick dream state, lingering between life and death in some middle realm; and so it was now. She was numb, within and without, swimming in the cold blackness, only hoping that she could finally rest; and yet she felt something touch her lips, something wet and cold and hot; it was novel, and still familiar. Distant voices spoke muffled words somewhere far in the distance, like sounds one hears when underwater.

The drink on her lips soaked in, past her mucous membranes and into her blood. Videsse felt as if she began to rise from the opaque sludge, her body becoming lighter, and easier to move as the perceived pressure lessened. At once she felt unbearably cold, and her muscles began to tremor in response, slightly at first and then violently as her form slowly ascended. She lifted her lead-weighted hands to her head, the tremors making it impossible to cover her face. Then only a moment after the peak of her tremors began, she felt her frigid core warm from the outside, as if suddenly aware of a blanket wrapping around her-the heated bacta bag. The tremors peaked and then subsided, just in time for the rising wave of a headache; and a mighty wave it was as it rose, swelled and subsided in a gently furious roll. At the crest, Videsse bit her lip and held her temples as if to prevent her head from exploding. Thankfully, she thought, it was only for a second.

Then, just like one rising out of the water, she opened her eyes and gasped as the dream fell from her in drips, her vision clearing, and the black mist receding; water from wet eyes. Her arms and legs gained strength as she waded out of the deep. Shadows, now exposed in the receding waves, fled to distant corners where they likely found holes back to another realm. Videsse tried to chase them with her eyes, but every moment fewer of them were visible, as her brain was now satisfied with the ounce of whiskey it had received and the hallucinations were no longer needed.

She felt as if she needed to vomit; due either to the last of the alcohol withdrawal effects or to Donal's flying which she was now aware of as her head slammed into the wall.

_Slave-1_ lurched downward, and every passenger lost their stomach; everyone, that is, except for the PZ droid, naturally.

"What was that!" Donal exclaimed, righting the ship, then hair-pinning to port.

"That's what I was telling you," Cam replied. "Their weapons are serious!"

Another white plasma ray lit almost half of the viewscreen.

"Holy stars!" Donal pulled up as hard as he could, and everyone was thrown more firmly into their seats. The stars of space filled the viewscreen again, and an unfinished capital ship skeleton sat in the distance.

"_Raider_, get on those coordinates, now!" Donal barked.

"Already on it," the droid brain replied. "Just get me some time, without killing us. Rear shields up." _Raider_ anticipated what Donal did not.

"How many are there?" It was Videsse.

Donal looked behind him surprised. She was gripping the back of the pilot chair with a wide stance to help steady herself in the darting movements of the ship.

"What! Get back in your seat. You-"

"Port now!" Videsse interrupted.

Donal reflexively thrust to port. A _Needle-class_ at eleven o'clock had fired, and the ray passed to the starboard.

"Head to the capital ship," Videsse ordered. "Dive!"

Donal pushed the control arm down. "Up!" He complied.

"How many?"

"Six. We got one of them planetside."

"They're faster than us. But they can't corner like we can. Keep zagging until you get to the capital ship."

Donal did. Videsse held onto the back of the seat, her feet lifting from the floor with his maneuverings.

"No, not the same way. Don't let them anticipate."

Another white flash lit the screen. "That's it! I'm taking over."

"Like Mustafar you are!" Donal objected. "You are in no condition-"

"If I have to break every one of your fingers off that control arm-just fly into the capital ship cavity, now! _Raider_, activate cloak as soon as we're in!"

"I think she's feeling better, Donal," _Raider_ stated flatly. "I'd let her take the reins."

Donal's lizard tongue lapped the air in anxious ascent. "Fine."

_Slave-1_ cornered into the empty cavity of the unfinished capital ship, and _Raider_ hid the ship in its cloak. Sparks from the skeletal frame flickered like embers in a dying fire, thousands of droids working sleeplessly to manufacture the ship. Arkania was building a navy, and building it quickly.

"All this droid activity will hide our heat signature for a second. Now, get out of my seat," Videsse ordered.

"You want me on guns then?" Donal said as he slid past her.

"Not a good idea. You'd probably shoot your own foot if you were behind my cannons," _Raider_ interjected.

Videsse laughed. "That's what Boba had always said about you, Donal."

She looked back at PZ-85 with his shattered shoulder. He could not help, she thought. Videsse exhaled forcefully and called to Cam. "Boots! I need you to stay on guns. Like shooting a blaster; you up for that?"

"No nicknames, remember-" Cam started.

"Shut up, Boots! Can you do it or not?"

There was a moment of silence as Videsse strapped in and gripped the control arm.

"Yeah, Patch. I can."

"Then let's get 'em." Videsse did not correct Cam, and he recognized it.

One of the _Needle-class_ snubs appeared in the open end of the capital ship, its cold purple and electric webbing actively pulsing within its stabilizers. It was ready to fire, even if it meant cutting through the capital ship. The pilot searched the cavity with his scanner, knowing that _Slave-1_ had a cloak, but with all the shimmering heat soldering from the droids, it took half of a second for him to see the matching silhouette of _Slave-1_; half of a second too long.

In an instant, _Slave-1_ materialized in the center of his viewscreen, accelerating directly at the Arkanian. Cam held his finger on the trigger, so a barrage of rapid laser blasts announced the _Firespray _starfighter. Just before contact, the Arkanian pulled the trigger, and in a flash, two white beams streaked forth from both stabilizers. Videsse had already pulled up, and the beams passed under her, cutting through the rear of the capital ship like a knife through paper, just before the _Needle-class_ disintegrated from Cam's assault. The center fuselage and engine disintegrated leaving the two firing stabilizers spinning like tops. Their rays whipped around in the explosion, slicing through the entire capital ship as they completed the violent spin and fizzled out. The massive dorsal and ventral pieces of the unfinished capital ship began to drift apart like metal framed asteroids.

_Slave-1_ flew fortunately above the rays and darted out of the open cavity, back into the fray. Videsse's heart jumped when she saw what the rays did, and how dangerous they were, even after the ship had exploded. Her hands trembled for many reasons. It was a close call, and she knew it.

"Uh, _Raider_," she said in a low voice so no one else could hear. "Don't say anything, but I might need your help a bit."

The console blinked as if _Raider_ had nodded his head.

Videsse bit her lip and accelerated as she spun _Slave-1_ around to stick close to the surface framework of the capital ship, keeping it on her port side. She knew in open space, the _Needle-class_ snubs had the advantage. She needed the obstacle to maneuver around.

One Arkanian ship was on her already, and a white flash blazed past her starboard. She pulled to port, almost scraping the capital ship as she rounded its sharp-edged stern. For a half second, the pursuing _Needle-class_ lost sight of _Slave-1_ as it rounded the corner, taking a wide arc. However, Videsse was back in its view as it rounded the starboard side of the capital ship. The dorsal half of the sliced capital ship rose and lumbered toward _Slave-1_, so Videsse laterally angled to starboard. In front of her, another Needle-class approached directly in line with her. She smiled and punched the acceleration.

"Here we go," she said, then bit her lip.

The oncoming ship charged its plasma beams. She pulled up the nose of _Slave-1_ and decelerated, almost to a stop, then threw the nose back down and punched the acceleration. To both the forward and aft enemy ships, it gave a split second illusion that _Slave-1_ was pulling up. Both Arkanians pulled up to follow, but with their speed and lack of maneuverability, their collision was unavoidable. They crashed into each other, the two snub fighters splintering into pieces, and then exploding when the sublight engines collided.

Videsse turned hard to port, but _Raider_ resisted slightly, avoiding the streaking fragments of the snub fighters as they shot past. _Slave-1_ ducked under the canopy of the dorsal capital ship, then hopped over the ventral portion to avoid the other snubs that came at her from starboard. White beams started cutting the framework to pieces, slicing through from multiple directions. They could now see her heat signature through the ship having followed her movements, and were just going to cut through everything to get to her.

One beam flashed in front of her, and divided the ventral frame in two. She dove through the opening.

"_Raider,_ we need to get out of here now!" Videsse shouted. "Half a parsec, I don't care."

"Get in the open," _Raider_ replied.

_Slave-1_ passed under what was left of the cut-up hull, and positioned the planet to her right. Two of the Arkanian ships, came up from beneath her, firing their slicing rays. The viewscreen filled completely with the hot white light.

Videsse hit the brakes hard and cut to port.

Cam screamed.

As she turned the ventral gun port was sheared off, and evaporated in the beam like cheese in a shredder.

"_Raider_!" Videsse pleaded.

"Aim back the way you were," he replied.

She darted down and back and away from the capital ship hull. Two _Needle-class_ ships now appeared in front of her, two beneath, and one behind, all their stabilizers crackled with purple electric fury.

"_Raider_!"

The white beams, at the speed of light dissected the void, precisely aimed at her. Hyperspace, however, is faster than the speed of light, and for one half instant, faster than even the mind can comprehend, one might have seen the brilliantly white beams pass by, as _Slave-1_ sliced in between the forward Arkanian snub fighters, and vanished in a distant minute point, the black space flashing white and then blue with the undulating nebulosity of hyperspace in the viewscreen.

Videsse exhaled and leaned forward onto the console, holding her mouth and trying not to vomit.


	37. Episode X As They Fall Asleep

And so we finally return to Geonosis; that lifeless desert planet, though not so lifeless now. Eskrats, and shadowmoths, and our travelers, and maybe a few spirits could claim the planet as their home. It was not their native soil, but rarely do any of us call our native soil home; the path of these lives seldom following an expected road, since these stories are never written by the characters themselves. The eskrats simply hid in a sack of quinto grain ages ago, looking only for food and a safe place to bear their young; a sack that was packed onto a ship and transported lightyears away. The shadowmoths only sought to be close to the faint dome lights of a ship, the only light on a dark night long ago and far away, and found themselves closed in until a brighter light appeared; another home, another place.

Thus it was with our heroine. She left this planet, seeking a ship; and more than a ship. She sought freedom; freedom from pain and heartache, memories and hope. What she found was not what she expected. It was the same thing Boba had found; the same thing Terrah had found. It is the same thing if we allow it, we all will find. For we all at some point find ourselves trapped, beyond hope, closed in, and helpless. There we lie, looking, as if from afar, on our helpless and hopeless bodies, shivering and suffocating, but then, by grace, we lift our head, and see the door open, the light flood in, the hope of something new, something unexpected, and maybe if we would allow it, something that seems like the hope we so foolishly ran from.

Donal supported Videsse, his arm wrapped around her waist, and her arm over his shoulder as they walked down the ramp of _Slave-1_.

"I'm not feelin' so good, again," Videsse admitted.

"Yeah, you're going to be on wavy ride for a week or so, Dess," Donal replied. "But we'll get you through it. Though, you aren't going to like it."

"Whatever," she said. "Like I like anything?"

Donal smiled, knowing the façade. He helped her to a bench near the living quarters of the Eyrie.

Cam and PZ-85 followed behind with hover crates as they unloaded _Slave-1_.

Videsse leaned back on the bench and took a deep breath, then rubbed her temples and closed her eyes.

"We lost my ship," she growled. "And my armor."

Donal nodded. "Yes, we did." He sat next to her and patted her knee. "Yup, _some_ things were lost. They always are."

Videsse, still rubbing her temples and her eyes still closed, thought hard for a moment. She sat next to a coward, that somehow had come through for her. A broken droid, stuttering, and limping, with a mangled arm, and yet a deadly droid when needed. PZ-85 currently helped Cam, an unwanted slave child; a child that managed to open his mouth and steal at every wrong moment, and somehow at the same time, every right moment as well. Among them, Videsse sat, a woman that thought she needed no one, yet she needed them all; a woman that in one moment rashly runs headfirst into the fray, and in another runs away from what she really needs. Videsse thought about these things and opened her eyes. Before her hung the carbonite cast of the Keeper, her kidnapper, and in his hands, an assassin droid's head, her pursuer. Her life was on the edge of a knife back then, and so it was here.

Videsse laughed at herself, much louder than was expected.

Donal looked at her confusedly. Cam and PZ-85 stopped and turned as well as if something impossible had just occurred; as if a starbird had suddenly streaked through the Eyrie just long enough for each of them to question whether their eyes and ears were deceiving them. If any of them were to share what they witnessed at that moment, an outsider may have just explained it away as fanciful mythology.

Videsse sat up and turned to look at the repaired and fully functioning _Millenium Falcon_, a ship that had slept for too long, with no crew to fly it.

"Donal," she questioned, not moving her gaze from the _Falcon_. "You gonna go back to Nar Shaddaa?"

"Can't see a reason to," he answered and scratched the back of his neck, still trying to make sense of Videsse's laugh. "Everything of mine there is gone."

Videsse nodded and spun around in her seat. She looked at each one of them, and finally said, "Then I think the _Falcon_ may have a crew again. If y'all are up for it, that is."

* * *

So, here is the end of our heroine's story, at least as much of it that I have taken upon myself to narrate. An endeavor, that for the love of our heroine, I have labored to tell. And although there is more to her life, and more to tell of her future, I must resist for my own time is short. How it is that for this short while, you have been able and willing to listen to these words, I do not myself understand, and yet, I will no longer tempt the fates detailing anything further. For I am sure you would not care to know about how our heroine had, by her actions in this story, influenced the political climate of the galaxy. Let another historian tell you the story of how the unrest on Nar Shaddaa that was caused by the death of Felga the Hutt led to the Senate's establishment of a military state over the Mid Rim to maintain order. Yes, let someone else tell of how the Jedi monks became aware of the burgeoning Arkanian Navy because Ben Solo had followed Videsse, and so witnessed its production; how the Jedi Council and the Senate then increased sanctions on Arkania, which shortly afterward led to the cessation of Arkania from the Galactic Senate. How many of the Mid Rim systems followed; systems that were already incensed over Senate military oversight. No, let not I, tell you that story. It is not for me to tell. I will gladly leave that for another more apt narrator to tell, perhaps even one from beyond the grave.

And speaking of the grave, let us remove ourselves from Videsse's Eyrie for one more time, and fly through the waning orange haze of Geonosis's evening twilight, letting the canyon move past us swiftly like a spinning ball, so that we can find our feet again in another large valley, Videsse's destroyed hut somewhere behind us, and the cliff face dark and looming before us. Let us, here and now, pay our last respects for the dead before leaving this planet to return home. For somehow, though their bodies have laid here under their barrows this entire time, it is hard not to believe, that somehow beyond our own limited senses, something, some unknown power, some influence, or some presence was at work, maybe even only at one moment. And still, if Videsse were here to speak the words, "Thank you," would the spirits really hear? Or would we just convince ourselves they did, and satisfy that unnatural and somehow natural longing to say goodbye to deaf ears?

Either way, here we stand in the orange glow of the timeless rings, two mounds before us, and two helmets turned slightly toward each other. They look tired and worn, and maybe they rock a little as if catching their breath.

Let us take this moment to speak the words we want them to hear. Someday, not too long from now, Videsse will do the same.

The wind tonight is gentle, and only disturbs small puffs of dust on the surface. Can you feel it? This breeze right now, that caresses our backs and blows a delicate sheet over the graves, like two warriors returning from battle, finally laying down on their beds, and covering themselves one more time as they fall asleep.

* * *

**A/N: Thank you for reading! My hope is that it was not just a good read, but a meaningful one. And so we part our ways here. May your journey lead you to hope; a hope we all seek but very few recognize. May God bless you in your walk through the desert valley of that dying planet, hopefully to green pastures and still waters; where the wind is at your back, and the road rises to meet you; where the rains fall on your fields and the light of the eternal Geonosis rings illuminates even the darkest night. **

**Next week I have one more chapter; an epilogue, where we see one more scene with Ben and Maz, tying up one more loose end. But our story of Videsse ends here. Thanks again. Follow, favorite, and comment if you enjoyed the ride. **


	38. Episode X Epilogue

The backroom of Maz Kanata's watering hole on Takodana was surprisingly dry and well cared for, considering that the rest of the establishment was kept by a Kowakian monkey-lizard. Maz, however, was sure to oversee the custodial duties of this one place, since this backroom was the meeting place for the quarterly assembly of the Jedi sub-council; a distinct group of the Jedi Order, established in response to Ben Solo's and Maz Kanata's separation from the Force. The sub-council consisted of Maz Kanata and Ben Solo, naturally, and two Force-sensitives; a "sympathizer" and an "objective" representative. By the Jedi's titles for the two Force-sensitive representatives, it was obvious what the High Jedi Council felt about those that had been separated from the Force, those that they called Force-Voids.

The establishment of the sub-council, however, was not a unanimous decision. The democratic vote came to four against five. Rey and the reborn Yoda sided with Maz and Ben. Kanan Jarrus was the elder of the majority vote. His age was chronologically eighty-seven, although biologically he was only sixty-seven, having been frozen in carbonite for twenty years. Kanan's granddaughter, Jaden, Ezra Bridger, and the remaining other two all followed Kanan's lead. Thus, the sub-council of Jedi Force-Voids was established and the backroom of Maz Kanata's watering hole was maintained with an ambivalent spirit.

The room was round and light-filled, a large open skylight lighting the room. A gold three-meter diameter circle marked the epicenter of the room, and four crimson padded stools rested at the four corners of the compass.

On three sat a member of the Jedi sub-council, cross-legged, straight-backed, and arms at rest. Ben Solo sat on the west opposite Maz's empty stool, and Jaden Syndulla and Rey sat on the north and south. They sat in silence, waiting for Maz, who was finishing business with an angry bounty hunter at the bar.

"You tell him he owes me three hundred thousand for the ship he stole from me," the female bounty hunter exclaimed. Without seeing her face behind the black Mandalorian helmet, her tone conveyed all the emotion needed. "And if he wants his lightsabers back, it'll be another thirty apiece."

Maz nodded calmly in assent but said nothing.

The bounty hunter seemed uncomfortable as if Maz had said something with her eyes that had convicted her brash demeanor.  
"And since he did save my life, I'll repay that by _not_ huntin' him down. Though, if I ever see him again, and he doesn't have my money, I'll kill him. You tell him that!"

"I will," Maz again complied.

"The last thing he needs in another Fett at odds with another Solo." The bounty hunter slammed twenty credits on the bar.

"You want a double whiskey then?" Maz asked.

"No, not for me. A round for those clones. I owe them." With that, the bounty hunter stormed out of the establishment, stepping over a stunned Besalisk at the front door.

Maz slid the twenty chip to the Kowakian monkey-lizard. "Here Gram, fill Dot and Spark's drinks again, complements of Dark Star."

She then retreated to the sub-council room, and quietly took her seat across from Ben.

Jaden raised her gaze to Maz and huffed impatiently, "Is there a problem?"

"Nothing that cannot be appeased," Maz replied as if unaffected by Jaden's loaded question.

Rey changed the subject in order to avoid a forthcoming tension. "We begin then as you have informed us, Ben, that Arkania was building a Navy. That it had already manufactured a dozen capital ships and numerous fighters."

Ben nodded. "Yes, I have witnessed them in production."

"My grandfather and the High Council will be interested to know of this," Jaden replied. "But that does not explain what you were doing on the planet."

Ben looked to Maz, but she looked forward intentionally not making eye contact.

"An Acolyte sect had stolen Darth Irata's-Rey's old starfighter, and I was investigating it further," he said not giving more information than was necessary.

Rey's eyebrows raised and she appeared surprised to discover this information. Her mouth opened slightly.

"And why was that of interest to you," Jaden inquired, leaning in further.

"It was one of many Force artifacts that this particular sect had been acquiring."

Rey rubbed her chin in thought before asking her first question. "Many religious sects seek artifacts. Why is this different?"

Maz answered this time. "We're not sure yet, and I cannot explain it, except to say that there was something different this time."

"As a Force-Void you should be reluctant to follow such whims, Master Kanata," Jaden instructed not even considering that Maz was her elder by over nine hundred years.

"What was different?" Rey pursued, trying again to avoid the tension.

"The bounty hunter that sought the ship . . . she was," Maz paused for a moment. "She was pristine of the Force."

Rey's face fell in sympathetic embarrassment. Jaden straightened up and her shoulders tensed.

"Another Void? How can you be so sure?" Jaden asked.

"I am sure because she-" she paused again and looked directly at Ben, "-hears the Whispers." Her eyebrows raised in a pleading gesture.

Jaden appeared shocked. "The Whispers? How do you know that?" It was a rhetorical question that the "High Jedi" had raised before. Jaden did not expect an answer, but an answer came.

"Because, I heard them, too," Ben said flatly, fully aware of what this would bring about.

Rey darted her attention from Maz to him. Her eyes were wide as if to ask, "Why did you say that?"

"You mean you heard your own thoughts like we all can hear our own thoughts," Rey asked, trying to give Ben a way out.

"No, Rey," Ben replied. "I hear them, like Maz, and like this bounty hunter."

"These _Whispers_. . ." Jaden said and then interrupted herself. "This council will not devolve into whims of delusion. We must speak of things we know, that which is concrete. As the High Jedi of this council, this council is closed and we shall report to the superiors your findings."

Jaden stood, somewhat flustered and exited without another word. Rey also rose but stepped closer to the still seated Ben and Maz. "I wish you hadn't said that Ben. Things are going to change."

Ben nodded. "Goodbye, Rey."

She turned and reluctantly left.

After half a minute, Ben leaned forward and massaged his temples. "They're never going to believe us, Maz."

Maz did not respond right away but squinted her wrinkled eyes, and took a few short breaths.

"You and I have much work to do," she finally stated with resolution. "The galaxy is balancing on the edge of a knife, and a time is coming when I fear the fate of the galaxy will rest on the shoulders of the Force Pristines. Rest assured, Ben, the Jedi, will believe us. I just hope it's not too late."

**To be continued in ****Star Wars Episode XI The Jedi Rift** **. . . **


End file.
